Bad Luck Streak Ends With $100,000 Fantasy Fishing Miracle
Unemployed for a year and recovering from heart bypass surgery, New York man reels in $100,000 playing FLW Fantasy Fishing
They say bad luck comes in threes, but not for Eugene Sullivan. The Syracuse, N.Y. resident broke his run of bad luck by winning the third tournament of an international online fantasy fishing game, FLW Fantasy Fishing (www.FantasyFishing.com), and claiming its $100,000 prize — by just a 15 point margin.
Out of work for nearly a year and facing mounting bills, the $100,000 win couldn’t have come at a better time for Sullivan. The 54-year-old data security administrator had been laid off by JPMorgan Chase a year ago amidst mass lay-offs within the financial services industry. His luck had taken a turn for the worse three weeks ago when Sullivan unexpectedly underwent heart bypass surgery, from which he is now recovering.
Last week, Sullivan went online to www.fantasyfishing.com and using an online research tool called Player’s Advantage, picked a team of 10 bass pros scheduled to fish the National Guard Open. He earned 12,188 points based on the performance of his ten bass pros who fished Lake Norman, near Charlotte, N.C., from April 23-26. The National Guard Open is one of six regular season tournaments on the Walmart FLW Tour, the largest and richest professional bass fishing tournament series in the world.
Sullivan scored big when he picked Stetson Blaylock, a rookie on the Walmart FLW Tour, to finish first, and Sean Hoernke, to finish fifth, two exactas that earned Sullivan huge bonus points. In addition, three of his other 10 bass pros finished in the top 10 of the National Guard Open. At just 21 years old, Blaylock became the youngest bass pro in Walmart FLW Tour history to win a major tournament taking the National Guard Open’s $200,000 first place prize. Blaylock, a Benton, Ark., resident fishing for the Berkley fishing team, weighed in 10 fish in the final two days of the tournament with a total weight of 23 lbs., 15 oz.
Sullivan’s $100,000 win was close — almost too close. Edging out Wadsworth, Ohio, resident Dan Broadbent by just 15 points, Sullivan won by the closest margin ever recorded in FLW Fantasy Fishing history.
“This is simply a miracle,” said Sullivan, who suspected that he had done well as he watched the National Guard Open final weigh-in on FLW Live, a live satellite broadcast available through flwoutdoors.com. “I desperately need the money. This will give me a cushion as I continue my job search. Thank you FLW Fantasy Fishing and FLW Outdoors.”
Sullivan learned about FLW Fantasy Fishing back in January when he visited the Turning Stone Resort & Casino in Verona, N.Y., which is located about 30 miles east of Syracuse. Sullivan registered for FLW Fantasy Fishing as part of Turning Stone Resort & Casino’s “Cast and Cash” promotion. Sullivan entered the first FLW Fantasy Fishing tournament of the 2009 season at FantasyFishing.com, which took place in February.
Sullivan, who has never played any other fantasy sports games, says he owes his $100,000 win to Player’s Advantage, the online research tool offered by FLW Fantasy Fishing, which he purchased for just $10. Not familiar with any of the bass pros who fish the Walmart FLW Tour, the Player’s Advantage research tool helped Sullivan decide which bass pros to pick before each FLW Fantasy Fishing tournament.
A recreational angler who enjoys fishing for just about any type of fish, Sullivan is now in 9th place overall in FLW Fantasy’s six tournament series and is within easy striking distance of the $1 million grand prize. But it won’t be without a fight; there are players in 123 countries competing to accumulate the most points over six tournaments and receive the $1 million grand prize on Aug. 1 in Pittsburgh, Pa. The current overall points leader, with 22,673 total points, is Terry Moberly, of Berea, Ky., who won $100,000 for the first 2009 FLW Fantasy Fishing tournament.
$1 Million Grand Prize to be Awarded in Pittsburgh, Aug. 1
FLW Fantasy Fishing, conducted by FLW Outdoors, brings the world’s richest bass fishing tournament, the Forrest Wood Cup, to Pittsburgh this summer from July 30-Aug. 2. The Forrest Wood Cup is the final event in the Walmart FLW Tour. Just like fantasy football and fantasy baseball, you can follow the leading money winners on the Walmart FLW Tour all season long at FLWOutdoors.com as well as on the “FLW Outdoors” television program, which is broadcast in high definition (HD) on VERSUS, the network that brings anglers the best fishing programming on television featuring the most trusted authorities on the water. The Emmy-nominated “FLW Outdoors” airs each Sunday from 12:30 to 1:30 ET. “FLW Outdoors,” hosted by Jason Harper, is broadcast to approximately 500 million households worldwide, including internationally through agreements with WFN (World Fishing Network) and Matchroom Sport to such countries as Canada, Germany, China, South Africa, Australia, Malaysia, Hungary, and the United Kingdom, making it the most widely distributed weekly outdoor-sports television show in the world.
In addition to the $1 million grand prize, and six $100,000 cash tournament prizes, FLW Fantasy Fishing players are eligible to win more than 1,800 prizes including a Ranger boat valued at $54,000, a brand new Chevy vehicle valued at $27,000, and personal watercrafts and ATVs valued at $8,000 each, and much more. Fantasy Fishing also offers $3 million exact bonus game for the player who correctly ranks the top five finishers in the Forrest Wood Cup, and a $5 million exacta bonus game for the player who correctly ranks the top seven finishers in any of the six regular season tournaments.
FLW Fantasy Fishing players can increase their chances of winning the $1 million grand prize by entering all FLW Fantasy Fishing tournaments throughout the season and accumulating a greater amount of points leading up to the Forrest Wood Cup. The next tournaments in the Walmart FLW Tour professional bass circuit include:
Tournament 4: Beaver Lake, Rogers, Ark., May 14-17, 2009 (Walmart Open)
Tournament 5: Kentucky/Barkley Lake, Benton, Ky., June 11-14, 2009
Tournament 6: Lake Champlain, Plattsburgh, N.Y., July 9-12, 2009
$1 Million Grand Prize Announcement: Forrest Wood Cup, Pittsburgh, Pa., Aug. 1, 2009
The Richest Fantasy Sports Game
In its first season, FLW Fantasy Fishing took the fantasy sports world by surprise offering the first $1 million guaranteed grand prize for a fantasy sports game. And with that announcement, FLW Fantasy Fishing soared to the top of the fantasy sports world, gaining fans from 123 countries attracted to the game’s $7.3 million in overall cash and prizes, the highest payout of any fantasy sports game in the world.
In 2009, FLW Fantasy Fishing once again set a new standard, offering a $1 million grand prize again along with 1,800 other prizes for a total of $10 million in overall cash and prizes.
http://www.fantasyfishing.com/
Source: FLW Outdoors
Top NFL Picks Branded by Former Sports Illustrated Editor
First-round draftees are products of Don Yaeger’s media training program which emphasizes branding
Four of the first seven picks in Saturday’s National Football League draft — headlined by top pick Matt Stafford of Georgia and number two selection Jason Smith of Baylor — and 24 players chosen in the first three rounds headed to their new teams after completing intensive Media Training sessions led by former Sports Illustrated associate editor and established media coach Don Yaeger and his Tallahassee-based team.
Aaron Curry, selected fourth overall by the Seattle Seahawks, has become a media darling since the combine. “I love to practice,” he said of his dedication to training. “You practice like you play and you play like you practice.”
It was the third year in a row that Yaeger has served as media coach to the draft’s Number 1 pick — and the third year in a row that nearly one-third of the top picks had been through his program.
“Twenty years ago, players were drafted solely on their athletic ability,” Yaeger said. “Now the most desirable draftees also portray a positive image and are able to communicate effectively. Our work with those players is intended to teach each player that he is a unique brand and that everyone — including NFL teams — want to align themselves with the best brands on the market. Teams know their players’ brands reflect directly on their own, so they are choosing much more carefully.”
“Obviously if you have the Number 1 pick, you’ve got to do your homework,” Stafford said of the Lion’s interview process. “We talked about anything and everything.”
Yaeger’s 180 Communications team partners with Athletes’ Performance Institute to prepare the players. API is a combine-prep center with facilities in Tempe, AZ, Los Angeles and Gulf Breeze, FL that focuses on enhancing performance on the field and recognizes the value of Media Training off of it.
“I have witnessed first hand, our athletes immediately implement the techniques they learn from Don and his team,” said Peggy Iralson of API. “The principles the athletes learn are a great value for their draft process and throughout their entire NFL career.”
The list of players Yaeger trained in this year’s draft also includes top-20 selections Darrius Heyward-Bey of Maryland, Brian Orakpo of Texas and Josh Freeman of Kansas.
“This was just a great group of guys,” said Yeager. “Stafford was very articulate and confidant, Smith has more personality than any offensive lineman I’ve ever met and Curry, well he just had this sincerity and enthusiasm that infected everyone around him.”
Source: 180 Communications
Fans Consuming Baseball at MLB.com in Record Numbers
After three weeks of the 2009 baseball season, it is evident that fans are interacting with MLB.com, the official website of Major League Baseball, in record numbers.
Below are highlights at MLB.com since Opening Day:
- MLB.com has delivered 127.2 million video streams, representing an increase of 136 percent over the 53.8 million video streams delivered over the season’s first three weeks in 2008.
- Over 400,000 subscribers have signed up for MLB.com’s premier live game products, MLB.TV and Gameday Audio, through April 26, a 45.7 percent increase of sales over the comparable time period in 2008.
- MLB.com has totaled 2.2 billion page views, an increase of 73 percent over the 1.3 billion page views accumulated over the first three weeks of the 2008 season.
- MLB.com has averaged 9.4 million visitors per day, representing an increase of 30 percent from the comparable daily average over last year’s first three weeks.
- The MLB.com network of mobile sites recorded 31.1 million page views on April 25, 2009, setting a new record for a single day. It marks the seventh day this year that it has surpassed the 20 million page view mark, including the previous record of 26.2 million established on April 25, 2009.
- MLB.com’s mobile sites have totaled 381.7 million page views across all internet-enabled devices, a 254 percent increase from the 2008 comparable time period.
- MLB.com has delivered more than 4.1 million video streams to mobile devices over the first three weeks, including real-time highlights to team alert subscribers. Compared to 2008, team alert subscribers are up 35.5 percent.
- Fans have downloaded more than 1.1 million MLB.com and Club icons to their BlackBerry smartphones for easy one-click access to the MLB.com network of mobile sites.
- MLB.com At Bat 2009, an application built exclusively for iPhone and iPod touch, remains the top-selling sports application in the Apple app store. It also has retained its ranking among the top 20 overall paid applications nearly a month after becoming available.
Source: MLB.com