Chapter 4 pages 65-67

Tommy along with Chuck were two owners that appreciated my work, paid me with regularity and planned on having me around for years to come. I also really liked Tommy's family as his daughter and sons were both a joy to be around socially.
A couple other offices included MVP and Jaguar. Jaguar was interesting because they had considerable success in radio in San Diego County during 2000. I noticed it was the excitement of Arnie Spandier the afternoon host on Los Angeles 1150. Sonny the owner of Jaguar a social gentleman in his late 50’s was very nice but let me know that he was happy with his current agency, Bob Elkington out of Sherman Oaks, CA. It turned out that Bob would be one of my greatest allies in working with all the Mall San Pablo companies in 2001. Sonny would be the first of Claude’s partners to leave and he did so before the 2001 season. Turns out Claude accused Sonny of stealing which was the norm for Claude, who accused everyone of stealing as a way to establish fault on someone else before allegedly stealing their company. Rumor has it Claude locked Sonny out of his offices and took over the offices hiring a young guy named Tim Bradley out of Providence, Rhode Island.

Brad as I referred to him seemed to be a nice guy but then again I thought that about everyone. Some would disappoint me some would please me to know them. As great as it is to know Chuck it’s equally as disappointing to know Brad. Brad would later end up running a questionable online pharmacy out of the Dominican Republic for the Ripners and later be the head guy at another current gaming company. Rumor has it Claude stole the database from BOS after the company went public, tore up his non-compete agreement and opened up the doors to another gaming company. I approached the company as a prospective client and thought I would speak with Brad over the phone but he refused to take any of my phone calls or return any of my emails. I guess I must have upset him along the way in life. I am like any other human being and usually I tend to piss off women and authority figures. I never would have figured this with Brad. After he just moved from Providence down to Costa Rica I invited him out drinking more than a few times to help him get acquainted with Costa Rican social life. I also set him up on live interviews with WSKO sports talk radio in his hometown where he would talk sports betting on the air with the show’s hosts. This would prove to be great for his business partnership as the head of Jaguar sports with a heavy influx of new customers from the Rhode Island area. It also established a trend of utilizing contests to get complimentary programming time on the air in exchange for services which included betting account prizes from the sports books.

One of the ongoing list of problems with being a partner of Claude was his company, BOS was stealing from you. I was aware that the phone systems were set up to intercept calls going into the sales offices for all of the partners. People would call in for the partner companies of Infinity, Millennium and Gibraltar to the BOS sales office to sign up, instead of transferring the call the word was to sign them up. Jaguar usually avoided this since Claude owned 100% of Jaguar. When I informed Shaun of this he just gave me the keep quiet sign with the finger to the mouth and ssshhhhh. Other forms of deception would include charging for media and not paying the media company or the agent that was responsible for the media placement. This made the partners of Claude look bad and he would use bad performances against the other partners to squeeze them out of money. I have to assume this one on Shaun because one of his numerous excuses for not paying me included the partners were not paying which I doubted because the partners were always prompt on payments with me before Shaun force them to filter the payments through BOS.

More tough work was to come when I returned to Los Angeles. ABC/ESPN, Citadel, and Jefferson-Pilot were easy accounts to handle. The companies felt at ease accepting the business based on the contracts with Fox Sports Radio and the Jim Rome Show. There was some caution on the part of Clear Channel stations especially with XTRA Sports 690 and 1150 in southern California. Claude didn’t want to be on those stations considering he had knowingly stiffed them in 2000 and the stations had hesitation with taking the business from other online gaming companies closely related to BOS. XTRA 690 San Diego was in my opinion the best sports radio station in the country with great personalities that included Lee “Hacksaw” Hamilton and Steve Hartman of today’s XTRA Sports 570 in Los Angeles which is a combination of the old 1150 and 690. Hartman also co-hosts for a Los Angeles television network with the esteemed Jim Hill. XTRA 690 was the station the late Chet Forte from Monday Night football built and the station that put Jim Rome on the map en route to be the top sports program in the country. And I cannot pass up XTRA 690 without mentioning Bill Werndel, the best local on air product endorser I dealt with. I could not leave these stations out because I wanted to get my clients results and this would be a nice media platform for Infinity and Millennium to get out from under the shadow of BOS.

When I proposed Southern California during the first weeks of the 2001 football season, Chuck Bauer and Tommy Miller jumped all over the idea. They spent around $30,000 a week between the two southern California stations and the results were very positive.

Claude’s perception of California was a huge underestimation that was mind boggling considering the history of California and gambling. I proposed Southern California stations to the Claude and his response was, “The stations do not work, southern Californians are not gamblers, they play at the beach instead of betting on football”. Nothing could be further from the truth. Southern Californians built the gambling capital of the world, Las Vegas. I-15 was the original bloodline for money into Las Vegas and even today nearly 30% of the revenue generated in Las Vegas is from California. For many years it was more than 50%. Southern Californians gamble. Folks forget that there is more to Southern California than the beach bums in San Diego, Orange, and Los Angeles counties. Riverside County, San Bernadino County and San Fernando Valley are not beach adjacent communities so filling up a sports bar with avid football fans is a common sight on Sundays in Southern California. Furthermore working in the beach adjacent southern California sports bar system during my early twenties it was standing room only on NFL Sundays and there were plenty of sports bar customers making phone calls on the payphone before cell phones became common.

Chapter 4 pages 62-64

After my proposal I was immediately passed around the San Pablo Mall to other holdings of Claude’s partners. That is when I started to really establish a great relationship with Chuck Bauer the owner of Infinity Sports Book and Casino, probably the smartest, most motivated online gaming owner in the industry at the time. We certainly do not see eye to eye on everything about the online gaming industry but we did agree on how to deal with customers. Treat them as if they are your lifeline. Chuck would leave Infinity a few years later to help out his mother after his beloved father passed. To this day I still believe in Chuck and I know his followers and employees believe in him as he is a top advisor for “BetOnline” today in Panama. He is also a young guy. He was in his late twenties when I met him in 2000. Chuck would regularly speak in person with his customers and would not get off the phone with any unhappy customer until they were happy. The offices of Infinity were small by comparison to BOS with wagering clerks, sales, customer service representatives, and linesmen all in the same room which was about 1500 square feet. Chuck was the only owner in the Mall San Pablo that paid me in full for my services. Chuck was everything that Claude wasn’t in a successful online gaming owner. He was respectful, humble, and good to his employees, not to mention he loved sports as much as I did. Ironically he isn’t even a citizen of the United States but dang he loves college football, especially SEC football and the legend of Paul “Bear” Bryant. His employees were much the same, charismatic, happy, enjoyable to be around and that is why when I wasn’t in the sales, VIP, or marketing offices of BetOnSports, I spent quite a bit of time down on the 6th floor with the good folks of Infinity who have mostly moved over to BetOnline based on referrals from Chuck Bauer.

As a matter of fact, I just spoke the other day with Andrew, the General Manager of BetOnline. Andrew is a friendly Jamaican fellow that had been around the Caribbean working for various online gaming companies. He came immediately when Chuck announced he was advising for BetOnline, and re-iterated my thoughts in a phone conversation about Chuck being a winner for the industry. What more would an employee want than a boss that takes care of his employees while walking the walk with hard work and getting the same performance out of his employees.

Chuck might have been the most personable person in the office and he was a workhorse. He didn’t always have time to spend out on the town for a young fellow. He did go out occasionally but Andrew took the role of leadership for Infinity when it came to going out on the town if Chuck was not present. He acted the part taking care of the hard working Infinity employees by buying them drinks while hanging out at the All-Star café across the street or at one of the many other establishments throughout San Jose.

When anyone asks me about a good online gaming company to play with I make sure to let them know about “BetOnline”. Chuck has a new name at BetOnline, as his buyout from BOS forced him to relinquish his name because it was very strong with his customers. If you call BetOnline with a problem there is a chance you will be speaking with Chuck and if not you will speak with one of his employees that represents themselves in the same manner Chuck does with the utmost respect for each and every person that might encounter a problem with their account.

I hate to say it but one person that I referred to Chuck beat him for about $23,000 while betting numerous money lines during the New England Patriots run to their first Super Bowl title in January of 2002. The guy got in and out quickly winning and never did give Infinity Sports Book and Casino a chance to win it back. Chuck paid the guy promptly upon request and I never heard any complaints. A few months later I am sitting around my friend’s apartment in Redondo Beach and he gets a personally signed letter from Chuck thanking him for his business. So that is exactly what you can expect from BetOnline these days great service and you get paid when you win with no stipulations or delays.

An example of good media and good business going hand in hand is BetOnline and www.Gambling911.com. I have read some great articles by Sting in favor of BetOnline. The articles seem to flow naturally because it’s so damn easy to talk about the truth as opposed to candy coating garbage. I have done both. I candy coated BOS till I couldn’t take it. As ugly as BetOnSports became there are great companies like BetOnline and great media like Rome and Gambling911.com.

Across the hall from Infinity was Tommy Miller at Millennium Sports book and casino. Tommy was a quiet small man with a very course voice due to years of smoking. Tommy when not busy was very interesting to speak with about his other ventures in Aruba and Curacao. Poor Tommy always talked about getting out of the online gaming business dating back to 2001 but his health was a problem as he suffered from cancer and needed the money to pay the medical bills. I also think Claude pressured him to stick around by his tactics with other owners that he ousted with no compensation. Tommy wanted to be as independent as possible from BOS by paying his own bills and dealing directly with me instead of working through BOS. He knew his place though around Claude as he was cast in a big shadow.

I thought Tommy was a nice guy but there was also hearsay that said otherwise. I heard rumors that he managed a company in Curacao and stole the database to start up Millennium in Costa Rica. He also apparently had a history of acquiring substantial amounts of prescription drugs and distributing them but again that is all hearsay.

Chapter 4 pages 59-62

Sadly to say I would have to deal with more ugly human realities over the course of the next year in the Mall San Pablo and have to buy a ticket for a Dutch girl that was fired by Millennium, one of the companies that was partnered with Claude. The girl was the mother of three children that was verified by her former employer, another client of mine at Royal Sports in Curacao.

As for business my main responsibility in Costa Rica during May of 2001 was to present to Claude a national electronic media campaign. I went down to the VIP room and Claude was as usual very quiet and stoic. I presented him with the Jim Rome Show, Fox Sports Radio and support by local radio with strategy of using all of their brands to fill up category limits for online gaming companies advertising on the stations to eliminate the competition along with utilizing the top local talent again eliminating competition while getting the first right of refusal for 2002. Neither, Claude or Shaun had any idea who Jim Rome was so I explained to them their familiarity with Rome was irrelevant and all that mattered was the 2 million avid sports junkies that listened to Rome every week. Then I compared Rome to print media that meant more than two issues of Maxim Magazine which had about a 750,000 circulation back then and the monthly costs for doing Rome was less than Maxim. That caught their interest and upon completing my proposal Claude lifted one finger and immediately Shaun gasped with eyes bulging out stunned that I had just gotten a one million dollar budget. Seconds later Claude raised a second than a third finger. I went down there really just hoping to get the budget for The Jim Rome Show of $500,000. I didn’t want to be embarrassed like I was in 1999 with Time Warner and Sports Illustrated. Getting $3,000,000 was beyond my wildest dreams and I was pre-planning in my mind to buy a house in the south bay of Los Angeles and taking my girlfriend and her son on vacation once I completed the 2001 campaign. My agreement with Claude was I would get 10% cash commission off of the top and I would get paid once the media was paid. The media was to be paid directly. The normal agency commission was 15% but my proposal with figures I received from the media were just too impressive. I believed this was going to be a financially lucrative year for all of the sacrifices I had made in the past for my business.

One thing for sure when it came to working with sports celebrities the Ripner’s were clueless. They requested a national endorser for the Rome show. I originally brought them the “Golden Boy”; NFL Hall of Famer, former Heisman Trophy winner out of Notre Dame and Vince Lombardi favorite Paul Hornung. When I first left Paul Hornung a message and he called back I immediately answered his every question with “Mr. Hornung”. The guy is a legend and I was in awe. All football fans should know him and those involved in sports gambling should know Paul Hornung since he was suspended for a season in the 1960’s for gambling. I told Shaun and Claude, Hornung wanted $100,000 for the endorsement deal but I had a hunch he would settle for $50,000. Shaun started laughing saying that no one was worth $100,000 to endorse and that they could get handicappers from Las Vegas to endorse BOS for a fraction of the price. This is true but then again you get what you pay for. Pay a premium for Paul Hornung who can make national news at anytime during the football season as the voice of Notre Dame Football or get Jim Fiest the annoying little fella that sends out obnoxious mailers to prospective gamblers around the country that has gotten more than a few guys in trouble from wives, parents and girlfriends.

Shaun and Claude had no idea who I was talking about in Paul Hornung and I am not sure they knew anything about Heisman Trophies, Notre Dame, the Packers or Vince Lombardi. To make matters worse Claude had this love affair for a Las Vegas handicapper with a slicked back thick head of hair and a cable television show with the production quality on par with the Saturday Night Live skit, “Wayne’s World”. The handicapper named Wayne allegedly got lucky with one of the customer service girls and Doogie would constantly ask the girl, “How was Wayne’s root?” With Mr. Las Vegas on the horizon my mind was now working hard to convince Claude to go with option number two, Steve “Mongo” McMichael. Mongo was fresh off an all-pro NFL career and was the top afternoon radio sports talk show host in Chicago after playing for years with the Bears. “Mongo” achieved national broadcasting fame with the World Wrestling Federation watched by millions on TNT and TBS. I ended up getting my way with a bit of concessions. The concessions were Mr. Las Vegas would do the television endorsements and Randy White the former Hall of Fame Defensive Tackle from the Dallas Cowboys would split the Rome show spots with “Mongo”. Now Randy has great football credentials but when it came to personality even in Texas, “Mongo” a former All-American at the University of Texas outdistanced Randy White by about 100-1 when it came to signing up new customers. As for the Mr. Vegas television experiment, it failed so miserably that BOS failed to capitalize on the power of television advertising which would launch Party Poker to the top of the food chain in the world of online gaming while BOS would plummet in the years to come after a key event in 2003. Had television shown signs of prominence than I believe Claude would have invested heavily into television. I made it a point to stay away from television due to the strategy which was similar to the early radio with bland ad creative. TV though in my opinion is the ultimate medium for gaining social acceptance in the US market.

Chapter 4 pages 57-59

I continued into the Central American night on a mission of whooping it up at an assortment of bars that would conclude at the Del Rey Hotel. Seeing that I was partying for two people (Tom and I), I picked up two beautiful black girls and brought them back to the apartment. By the time I got back to the apartment everyone was asleep. Meanwhile, I was fired up on hormones and alcohol. The good thing about my entry into the apartment was it was almost sunrise and Tom and DD would need to be eventually awakened by someone so they could head off to the airport. On the downside I am not sure they were expecting the ruckus that would ensue. DD always complained about the damn birds that were waking them up in the early morning just outside their window. She wanted to kill that bird. As bad as that little bird was it was not nearly as wild as being awakened by yours truly giving two Spanish speaking chocolate beauties some phallic discipline as I chased them out of the apartment while butt ass naked slapping them in the hind quarters with my manhood.

If the girlfriend were to ask me today in a profound President Bill Clinton response I could exclaim, “I did not have sex with two girls in Costa Rica!” I might have gotten a similar impeachment though for a lack of agreeable interpretation. Tom as usual was jovial and came out of his room laughing while DD wore the look of shock that she would soon get over and chalk up to more Costa Rican madness as she had seen plenty in the 12 months they spent in Central America. If only Tom and DD were witnesses to that act I would have been ok, but at the time a newcomer to BOS, a young 22 year old kid that would later become the customer service manager had just relocated from the UK and was living in the apartment also. The young man’s name was Jaime and he would become a longtime employee with BOS until the day they closed their doors as the head of customer service and the influential Jaime spread the legend. Heck, according to other executives at BOS Jaime picked up the slack when I was not around, staying out till the early hours of the morning and making a name for himself at the local brothels. I get a warm feeling in my heart knowing that there was at least one young kid that was influenced for better or worse by my actions outside of the BOS offices. Once in the office, even with sales I was exceptionally professional. I had a mentor also and he would end up taking his act on the road to Thailand. If Jaime is reading this he will be pleased to know that I have stepped up my act but with a little bit more class than our early encounters that bright sunny spring morning in 2001.

Four years later while having a very nice dinner in Costa Rica during a business trip with my boss, Lance Hanish from a Santa Monica ad firm, my longtime friend Johnny Ray or JR for short, a former executive with BOS, his wife Marilyn and their son Marty; this guy comes up to the table and soon as he hears my name blasts out a robust “BLACKSAW!!!!”. Then he went right into the story of the two black girls and my phallic discipline chasing these two girls out of the apartment, down the stairs and past the security guard to catch a taxi in the early hours of Tom’s escape from Costa Rica without a stitch of clothing on my bare ass. I am not sure if the boss heard the guy speaking because I immediately jumped in trying to drown the guy out and doing my best to shush the guy.

The guy’s name was Eddie King, a local radio DJ that did internet radio for an online gaming company. When I returned to Southern California I listened to his show regularly a couple of times a week for an hour a day when I could. He had a great show. It’s too bad his employer let him quit because he was great on the air. We would often email each other during commercials as we shared laughs about our perception of life in Costa Rica which could be just as twisted as that morning when Blacksaw was borne. Sometimes while he knew I was listening he wouldn’t bother with the email and just say exactly what he had to say to me over the airwaves. Not sure what Mr. King is doing these days but he should be on the air for an online gaming company because he could draw a crowd. He certainly didn't like Jim Rome out of professional competitiveness. I think with the right platform and dedication to the craft Eddie could draw a better crowd and compete with Rome. But that is a big “if” because Rome is proven. Much like you hear about great playground basketball players that should be in the NBA; if those players made the sacrifices to be the best they would be there, those that come up short just don’t always make the sacrifices.

In regards to Tom, George took him to the airport for his final departure from the San Jose International Airport. Later Shaun was considerate enough to say what I did was nice while re-iterating that Tom and DD were adults and not BOS’s responsibility to take care of them. Just a sign that Shaun might not be a total ass and has what I thought was a glimmer of human decency. As a business owner myself if someone in my company makes a mistake than as the owner I have to take responsibility because I hired them. If I promise someone to fly them to and from a specific job I don’t fly them in and then tell them once the job is finished they are on their own. People have different perceptions on how to run a business and part of the greater Ripner family business plan included, once you get everything you can out of someone despite any prior agreements you are not responsible to uphold your end of the bargain because it might cost money, every penny that is not paid is another penny maintained in the grander scheme of becoming a billionaire. I wondered if $50,000,000 was not enough to live off of by the Ripner needs.

Chapter 4 pages 52-57

Although Corky deceived me on ad creative, she was integral with her persistence of low rates and was the first person I ever heard coin the term, “BOS”. She constantly referred to BetOnSports as BOS and the term would eventually stick. Prior to BetOnSports and BOS they were known as the North American Sports Betting Company or NASCO. Claude loved that name.

Now I had the Rome show, Fox Sports, and just about every major local radio station ready for my pending presentation that I would reveal in my upcoming trip to Costa Rica in May of 2001. I presented to Claude my strategy of focusing on national radio advertising and supporting it with local programming. I flew down to Costa Rica and stayed at the same three bedroom apartment I was at before with Tom and DD. This time when I came to the airport there was Tom with a big grin waiting for me with one of the Tico employees driving. Tom was a super friend and a great salesman. He supplied me with plenty of first hand information from customers after I had left my first trip to Costa Rica which only lasted until early September of 2000.

Unfortunately, Tom a 45 year old worn out party veteran was suffering from the Costa Rican nightlife. On our last trip we often went out drinking and smoking some of Costa Rica’s finest. This time I was stunned to see Tom in really bad shape. He was throwing up at the office, falling down in the office. It was a bad situation. Meanwhile Claude and Shaun ignored the problem Tom was having as an employee. According to Shaun, Tom was not needed until the start of football season. This annoyed me because the sales employees were flown into Costa Rica with the agreement that when their services were completed they would be flown home upon their request when they completed the season. Tom was certainly entitled to this respect considering he was one of the finest salesmen in the office bringing in millions of dollars in new accounts. I was appalled by Shaun’s response to the problem when I brought it up.

On top of Tom's health problems neither he nor DD had much money considering the simple wages they earned. An airplane ticket home would cost them over a week's worth of work. An argument could be made that Tom didn’t help matters by spending all of his money on booze but that wasn’t true. Tom was actually very frugal in spending money and would usually buy a couple of small bottles of guaro or vodka and chug them without the benefit of a mixer from the local discount stores on the lowest floor of the Mall San Pablo. So he was not paying bar prices by any means and if he did go out to the bars he would spend nothing more than a few thousand colones or $10 – 20 at most making sure he chugged a few beers before heading out and usually did the brown paper bag walk en route to the bars. DD did her best to save by cooking at home and managing the dollars so they could buy a couple of plane tickets back home. But the reality that faced them at home was they would have no money to get an apartment, car, or anything else due to their dilapidated funds. The choice for Tom and DD was let Tom kill himself with booze or fly back home and than once they got home it's live with the parents or be homeless. Watching the Ripner’s neglect this responsibility sickened me.

I was making decent money and was due a lot more plus I had a nice comfortable home situation back in Torrance, California with my lovely girlfriend Odinga, her son, Deron whom I took on the fatherly role and our family pet, my personal pride and joy “Sparky” a Halloween born mutt that came out of an alley exactly 1 block away from where the 1992 LA riots in South Central Los Angeles erupted. She has the softest fur with a lovable friendly demeanor that endeared her to all the dogs and people in the neighborhood. Meanwhile back to reality in Costa Rica, Tom was in bad shape. I couldn’t stand seeing him drink himself to death anymore. I took on the responsibility of getting Tom and DD two tickets to Arizona so they would have enough money to get an apartment when they got home.

I knew Tom and DD were going to be taking off a day before me in the spring of 2001. I figured it’s time to go out with a bang! Tom and I ended up starting out at the All-Star Cafe, where Tom faded fast and opted out with an early night. He was in horrible shape and just couldn't handle one more drink. Since Tom couldn’t hold up his end of the bargain with the drinking, carousing and playing around I pledged to him that night I would honor him by pulling double time. This was probably the night that the legend of Blacksaw took full flight. I had been nicknamed Hacksaw during the 2000 football season and during the spring Doogie and Joel started calling me Blacksaw for my love of women. My girlfriend was born in Zaire with a deep dark skin tone and I love the Williams sisters in tennis, especially Serena. More times than I can count while having sex I fantasized about Serena Williams. Thank you Serena and sorry to any women I have offended.

Chapter 4 pages 52-55

I have always believed living in Los Angeles was the key because there were no other representatives of the industry actively pushing online gaming business like myself at the time on US soil that travelled with regularity to see the clients in foreign territories. Unlike most of the marketing executives in the industry I was very confident that I was conducting business with the highest of ethics and at no time did I break any laws, thus had no fear of backlash by authorities. I believed in the online gaming industry. I still do today although I feel it has been necessary for the US government to put up opposition since the industry has failed to take initiative to give back to the country that is its greatest supporter. The citizens of the United States made the online gaming industry what it is today. Thus the citizens of the United States should get some programs funded by online gaming for all of their support. Business is not all about taking, you have to give back and most of the industry has failed to do so. There are some very good companies in the industry that have shown excellent charitable contributions to US charities which should be acknowledged.

The Jim Rome show was a major prize for BOS considering less than two years earlier the online gaming industry was banned by the Jim Rome Show. Rome is about as anti-gambling as one can be always blasting gamblers as being less than desirable but the fact is the jungle dwellers that listen to the Rome show are gamblers. I think the gambling jungle dwellers enjoy the abuse that Jim gives them on the air much like a high powered executive enjoys an occasional ass whipping from a pint sized dominatrix. I met Jim Rome on the elevator at the Sherman Oaks studios along with other members of his team. While on the elevator Mr. Rome with the big voice was none too happy to know that I wasn’t going to use the complimentary tickets to his Tour Stop in Phoenix but would instead opt to meet up with a friend I hadn’t seen in years to play some golf. I am not sure whether Rome was being sarcastic or just joking when he asked Kraig if he could have the day off to go golfing instead of doing his tour stop. He might have been a bit spiteful considering he knew I was representing an industry that he loathed. Needless to say his first impression was not that great but bottom line, his show is the best in sports radio based on the number of listeners he draws and the talent that his team gets to do interviews. Also the world of gambling needs guys like Rome to instill the order or checks and balances. If no one ever questioned gambling than I believe fixed games would be far more prevalent.


The Rome show led to an immediate referral to Fox Sports Radio, which took the business immediately. Now we had two major names in sports media that would aid in opening up the doors to numerous other media companies throughout the United States. The 2nd phase of my plan was to go after all the local sports radio programming throughout the country. I was able to communicate through hundreds of radio stations by subcontracting with national media buyers for the major conglomerates of Clear Channel, ABC/ESPN, Infinity Broadcasting owned by CBS Global Media, Susquehanna, Citadel, Entercomm, Jefferson-Pilot and other independent stations throughout the US along with handling quite a few stations personally.
The account executive for Premiere Radio, Jerry Stehney was great. In good faith he made an introduction to a network of radio media buyers in Los Angeles which firm I will not name due to the lack of professionalism by one person led by Corky Flynt. Corky was a fast talking female in her 40’s that had been around the radio game for some time. She had great contacts and she really did a bang up job. Her problem though is she didn't care about the client only the money and almost cost me the account due to her deceitful nature. She just wanted to get spots on the air rather than getting approved spots on the air. One of many problems with online gaming advertising is one has to be very respectful on how they present themselves to both media companies and the public. Gambling is a lucrative business, just short of a license to print cash and you do not want to step on any toes or upset any anti-gambling groups because it’s too easy to run a clean business. So I had to get ad copy that was approved by both BOS and the media. This was no easy task and Miss Flynt certainly was not up to the task and she tried to force the square peg into the round hole by submitting non-approved radio ad copy hoping that the client down in Costa Rica would never hear the spots. Claude might not have been a marketing genius but he paid close attention to details when it came to getting a return on investments and knowing what advertising was representing his company in the US would never be an oversight. He called for stations to send ad copy of the creative or taped spots. When they started coming in I was extremely embarrassed, angry, and upset.

Fortunately Corky's top media buyer and my whipping boy of the time was the national sales representative for Infinity Broadcasting, Brett Rateaver. I questioned Brett's character for giving me a really inflated bad rate on one station that was a 1000% higher than what another sports book was getting. He went from goat to my own personal hero with the way he cleaned up Corky's mess after I relieved her of duties and Brett oversaw the 5 other national media buyers. Through adversity Brett came through with flying colors displaying the utmost professionalism despite our early disagreements. I apologized to him later for making harsh remarks towards him about what I thought were unprofessional tactics. I assume Brett made a lot of money off of the BetOnSports account. He forgave me over the phone but I feel the need to come out with a public admission stating that if you ever run across Brett Rateaver from Infinity Broadcasting or formerly from Infinity Broadcasting, you should want to do business with him because he goes the extra mile and then some. Everyone makes mistakes but professionalism is priceless and Brett is one hard working professional.

Chapter 4 pages 50-52

Chapter 4
Online Gaming, Big Businesses,
Big Business



I did such a bang up job on cleaning up the half million dollar radio investment in 2000 that Shaun called me while I was still in Tampa the day after the Super Bowl between the Baltimore Ravens and the NY Giants. I was nursing the hangover of Super Bowl week when Shaun informed me I would be their agency of record for radio and as much media as I could acquire them. Unlike US businesses the offshore gaming companies would say get as much as possible. Then you would do exactly that and often they didn’t have the money to invest in the early years. When you asked for a budget they were raw stating if something works they would invest. One had to get used to these communications because working with US businesses, most of them have a budget in mind. Back then if you were told to get as much as you could and submitted a budget for a million dollars most of the companies would back out.

My focus at the time was electronic but was not limited to that media alone. I was free to do billboards, print, etc. but electronic was where I felt the client was best served since there were limited competitors. One thing about the Ripners they were advocates of being at work early and got the jump on the rest of the industry preparing back in February for the 2001 season. Sports Books had a window for success in advertising; 80% of the customers sign up between late August and October that coincided with the start of football season with the first two weeks of September as the peak for new sign-ups. As the industry has evolved the public is more used to online gaming sites and sign ups are more spread out.

I dove into the 2001 campaigns with a greater passion than anything in my life including sports which was my lifelong love. I enjoyed the challenges in the upcoming months working all night to achieve a goal of putting together the best ad campaign the industry had ever seen, which I would accomplish. My strategy was to go after every major sports radio station in the United States starting out with the national shows than supporting them with local shows. I also had the ability to place media for other brands owned by BOS that included Millennium, Infinity, and Jaguar.

My immediate strategy was to lock up the largest national sports talk show in the country. The Jim Rome show. I worked tirelessly for the first few months making frequent trips from my home in Torrance, California to Sherman Oaks and other locations in the south bay to meet up with media executive Jerry Stehney. I convinced Shaun to budget $500,000 for the Jim Rome show and would get approval. The $500,000 commitment for 13 weeks was enough for Jerry to get me in front of Kraig Kichen, the President of Premiere Radio. I came into Kraig’s office one day dressed in total California business wear of shorts, loafers and polo shirt. I would never dress again like this for a major media executive but I was extremely confident and prepared to present to Kraig. I also wanted to portray the image of the industry which at the time was extremely laid back. Kraig is a brilliant businessman.

After all he is the leader of a company that put together national programming that includes Rush Limbaugh, Jim Rome, Art Bell and Dr. Laura Schlesinger (who karate kicked me). I think the five foot tall Dr. Laura was taking a kick boxing class or something and wanting to see how high her leg could kick. I got a good giggle of out her playful aggression towards me in the building lobby as did she.

Kraig did his homework on BOS and I shared with him the short history of the industry and the importance of doing business with an industry leader as opposed to a non-established company that could be embarrassing had they failed to hold up their end of the bargain and pay winners. At the time I was sold on the legitimacy of BOS and I sold it to Kraig. I did this despite the default on payment one year prior to Clear Channel stations XTRA Sports 690 and 1150 in San Diego and Los Angeles respectively which were affiliates of the Jim Rome Show. I asked Shaun about this default and he claimed the agency kept the money and defaulted. Knowing Shaun now, I have to assume he lied to me. At the time I trusted Shaun and probably was blinded by my own greed too. Kraig knew about the default and was adamant about payment up front or no deal.

Kraig shared with me the reasons on why he took the business:

1. I provided him with precedence of working with a station that had previous prohibitions with assumed laws in the state of Florida with WQAM in Miami. In 2000 I broke down the barriers with WQAM and this laid a lot of groundwork to work with bigger and better programming.

2. I provided him with a legal document out of the Cornell University law website on the New Orleans Broadcasters Association versus the United States.

3. $500,000 up front.

4. I lived in Los Angeles County and if he had any problems he didn’t need to worry about international borders because he could easily locate me.