Rivals.com operation

I know they've probably been hit by the economy, too, but anybody have any ideas what's going on with folks/operation at Rivals.com?

I've sent e-mails and left voicemails with 5 or 6 of their editors about every three or four weeks since January, including Tom Bergeron, about joining them as a publisher of one of their high school sites that's basically been sitting dormant for a year or more.

And nobody has shown me the professional courtesy of any kind of response or explanation.

I thought they ran a much better operation than that.

Any input/ideas welcome.

 

Go have a kid, raise him to be a football star, and then in 18 years they'll give you any kind of journalistic fellatio you want as long as you promise them the "scoop" of where that kid is giving a soft verbal. Otherwise they have no use for you.

 

Just a rumor, but word on the street is that Rivals is falling apart at the top. I hear its headquarters has been shut down and the head honchos are working from home. It exists, but it's in deep trouble.

But that's just what I hear.

The extension of that is they let the people who knew how to run the operation walk out the door and form 247, which is evidently kicking Rivals' butts and making it another wasted investment for Yahoo.

 

What you've heard on the street is wrong.

Disclosure: I run one of the high school sites, as evidenced by the user name.

We just had a publisher conference in Las Vegas, hosted by Yahoo and with several other sponsors. Close to 200 publishers attended. We're putting forth several initiatives that will strengthen our standing as a network and as individual sites.

There have been some changes, yes, in the location of some people. But the network's core are its site publishers, and none of them work at the headquarters. We have a ton of support at Yahoo, have established several new partnerships, and the goal of the conference was actually to lay out new plans moving forward and to build on the already strong relationship between Yahoo and Rivals. We're trending up, not down.

Seriously, a lot of this stuff is bad blood from those who are competing against Rivals. We're not going anywhere.

 

Then I stand corrected. I have no dog in this hunt, I was just passing along the water cooler conversation from yesterday.

 

Not sure who all you've contacted, but Tom's pretty good about answering emails. Sure you have the right address?

And I'm not sure which high school site you're referring to. Last I checked, they're all either very active or have at least been active within the last month or two.

 

Understood.

I've just seen comments on several sites, especially on the competitors, and people are running with every rumor. Nine times out of ten, it's best to stay quiet and let the dogs chase their tails, but this is getting ridiculous.

 

This couldn't be further from the truth...the Florida State, Texas, Nebraska, Iowa and Clemson sites all just signed big extensions with Rivals.

The only reason Alabama left is because Shannon Terry owned them and the Tuscaloosa News came in and took their place.

The only reason why the Landmark publishing sites left Rivals was their deal was not renewed and it was a unanimous decision by all involved at Rivals the magazine partnership was not needed anymore. All but one of the seven Landmark sites were manned by Rivals people that all still remain with the company.

Not sure why there's been such an effort to start a smear campaign against Rivals, but they remain as strong as ever with new leader Eric Winter taking things over.

 

My name is Eric Winter and I run the Rivals.com business. If you have any questions, or any needs, please email me directly: eric@rivals.com

Not only are we stronger than ever, we just re-signed 12 of our top 20 publisher sites - with the other eight still in long-term deals.

We did close our nashville office, which was the former HQ of rivals.com

As you can imagine, Yahoo! has scores of offices around the world. But the HQ for Yahoo! Sports (and rivals) is in Santa Monica; thus, it made sense to have it all run from here.

Again, please email me directly: eric@rivals.com

Thanks for letting me bend your ears ...

 

People who were working in Nashville ---- where are they working now?

 

Some will work from home. Others will move to a Yahoo office in Dallas.

 

Lots of good answers on this thread, but I think LongTimeListener has the best one.