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The Origin of MLBTradeRumors.com
Inspired by this post over at ProBlogger, I'm going to slip in the occasional post to fill newer readers in on the basics of MLBTradeRumors.com.
First question: why did I start writing this site? For that we have to backtrack to 2005. During the early part of that year, I discovered online poker. This was a time before I lived with the woman who would become my wife, and it was kind of bachelor-ish. I'd played poker with my buddies regularly but online was different. It's addictive and ridiculously fast-paced. The money seems less real. There are many debates on whether it's rigged for new users; I seriously doubt it. But I won some money early on and was hooked.
I don't have an addictive personality, but I do love to gamble. Online poker was really engulfing every second of my free time. I would eat meals while playing a hand at the computer. I thought about trying to play at work. If I made $100 in a day I dreamed about quitting my job. I only lost a few hundred bucks over the long-term, but regardless it was just a colossal waste of time.
Sometime in June of '05, a coworker and I were chatting. He suggested I write a blog about fantasy baseball, because I loved that game and enjoyed writing. I didn't even know what a blog was at the time. Another motivator is that my wife-to-be moved in with me, providing good reason to lay off the online poker and find a reasonable hobby. So I started up one of those free Google blogs with the aim of writing every day. I chose the name RotoAuthority after seeing that RotoDoc and RotoGods and RotoWhatever were all taken.
Desiring a more easily typed-in domain name, I switched over to the TypePad blogging service in July. Here's my first RotoAuthority post, a fairly arrogant one. Since the trade deadline was in July, a lot of my fantasy coverage crossed over with the hot stove. I also began writing (for free) for a site called Addict Fantasy Sports in an effort to get more exposure. Here's an example of that. I did my first Top 50 Free Agents List in October and got some decent linkage to that.
As more and more of my writing on RotoAuthority drifted towards the hot stove, I decided it needed to be kept separate. I chose a different-looking, cooler black and white TypePad template and kicked things off with a Torii Hunter rumor. For the name of the site, I just wanted something straightforward and somewhat memorable. Also I'd learned from my RotoAuthority traffic referrers that "MLB Trade Rumors" or some similar variant is commonly typed into search engines during hot stove season.
I'd worked pretty hard at promoting RotoAuthority, emailing other bloggers and posting on all kinds of message boards with the link in my signature. MLBTradeRumors was different. It just spread virally, getting decent traffic almost instantly. This site has a broader audience and lends itself to linking more.
Tomorrow we'll talk a little about the Wild West early days of MLBTR.
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This is a pretty cool story. I've been here from the start but I think its cool to look back on how this all happened.
Posted by: registereduser | August 21, 2007 at 02:11 PM
Good stuff. Very nteresting.
If my goal of working in PR for an organization doesn't work out I hope to focus my baseball interest into something like what you've done with RotoAuthority and MLBTR.
Posted by: Nolan | August 21, 2007 at 02:29 PM
I wonder how many folks have been around since the beginning.
By the way, the first link in the fifth paragraph is supposed to go here:
http://www.typepad.com
But it won't update for some reason.
Posted by: Tim Dierkes | August 21, 2007 at 02:31 PM
Alright I fixed that link. TypePad is cool for those without web design savvy.
Posted by: Tim Dierkes | August 21, 2007 at 02:33 PM
Very cool indeed. Always nice to know how things started and how they're going strong years later. I had similar success with my Mets message board and it lasted a good 4 or 5 years before it kinda died and I lost interest in getting new members again.
Keep up the good work Tim, you can never have enough Rumors or Fantasy Evaluations. And thanks for all the time and effort you've put into your work, it shows.
Posted by: BaLLooNNoT | August 21, 2007 at 03:18 PM
I just found this sight in July when I was looking for free agents at the end of this season and I just got hooked on it. Refreshed it every 10 seconds or so on the trade deadline. Awesome website.
Posted by: Braves1029 | August 21, 2007 at 03:34 PM
"I just wanted something straightforward and somewhat memorable. "
Thats funny, cause the first time I visited this site, I was just looking for some rumors, thus I typed in MLB Trade rumors, expecting to find about 100 different sites, yet I ended up here, and have been hooked since.
Posted by: nrmax88 | August 21, 2007 at 05:13 PM
Braves, me too man during the winter wanted to real about Soriano and LEe and Zito and everybody, and ended up here. Not only are the stories/rumors interesting, but the posters here are like no others. Some of them are complete idiots, some of them think I am a complete idiot, but its almost like a big online baseball dysfunctional family :).
Posted by: nrmax88 | August 21, 2007 at 05:15 PM
How much would you say you get from the adds?
Posted by: buehrlebro | August 21, 2007 at 05:54 PM
I have been around for almost the start and I discover Roto through here and use both. I think the hunter post was the second one down when I started visting and have been coming back everyday.
Posted by: Paul AKA twinsfan | August 21, 2007 at 08:12 PM
That's funny nrmax, I think of it the same way. There are probably a hundred screen names here I recognize. I have a mental image of many.
Paul I do remember you were one of the first.
Posted by: Tim Dierkes | August 21, 2007 at 09:08 PM
i remember when i first discovered this site. First i found RotoWorld, then RotoAuthroity, and then this site. Tim and the bloggers who take your plce when your gone or something, I truely tahnk you for letting me find a site where people actually know there baseball.
Posted by: bravesrule14 | August 21, 2007 at 10:30 PM