Filling the first leagues was always the primary objective of year one. A secondary objective was to get other fantasy sports sites to recognize FSRU.com as a legitimate player in the fantasy sports community. To do this, you need to make contacts.

So I figured, why start at the bottom? I contacted Ron Shandler. If you are wondering who Ron Shandler is, well, he is a guy who won the 1998 Tout Wars AL and NL fantasy baseball leagues. But it was not that he won both leagues in such a premier expert league that got him his expert among experts reputation, it was how he won them. He used the no closer, all offense strategy after he admittedly screwed up his drafts and ended up without a closer in either league. When he won both, he was legend. He has continued to dominate expert leagues ever since.

I introduced myself and explained my personal resume in fantasy baseball, and the new website, FSRU.com. I asked for an LABR, League of Baseball Reality – Baseball Weekly’s Expert League- or Taut Wars invitation recommendation. Ron was the consummate professional, but it was a “no go new guy.” And I heard no a lot. Finally, a new contact, Seth Trachtman of Baseball Insider, told me to stop the hunt. I was not in the club. The experts, as far as they were concerned, were a very exclusive group, and they were informational sites only- A leagues site had never been in the club, and they would never be in THE CLUB. Ok I figured, if you cant join‘em, beat‘em. Seth and I were ready to play. I went to work and two weeks later, The Fantasy Sports Invitational Challenge (FSIC) was born and invitations were being sent out to all the major sites already participating in Taut Wars and the LABR. The invitations went out, and the refusals came back, one after the other.

 Seth explained that the site is like the ugly new girl in the corner, if one handsome man wants to dance with her, they will all dance with her. It’s all about perception. I gave up on the club and moved on to the many non-club members. They too were all saying no. And then, finally, someone wanted to play the new expert league- an acceptance- a major acceptance. Brendan Roberts of the Sporting News.  And with Brendan’s name and the Sporting News on every invitation that went out from that point on- the other sites began to flock to the new expert league. 

And who joined the new league? Well, all the sites rejected by the club of course. Four years later, the FSIC now stands as the number 1 viewed expert league on the net. Put in “fantasy baseball expert league” on ANY search engine and you can see it on, oh yea, page 1. And with all those sites and contacts, came lots of links back to FSRU.  The ragtag group of league members now had a rag tag team of castoff experts playing along side them.  The most notable of the group, Brendan Roberts, won the NL-Only on the last day of the season- and the site reps loved it. A reputation began: A reputation for service, a reputation for excellence, and a reputation for, well, not being part of the club.