Who: Paul Charchian
What: Co-Founder, Fanball; radio host; founder, LeagueSafe

How far back do you think this fantasy sports industry goes back? Sure, we all know about the GOPPPL starting fantasy football back in the 1960s, but what about this era of magazines and websites and podcasts and more advice than anyone can sort through?

Well, it’d probably be tough to find much fantasy content that predated the 1993 launch of Fantasy Football Weekly.

“There was no information available of any kind once the season started,” says Paul Charchian, who co-founded the magazine in Minnesota’s Twin Cities with Rob Phythian.

Charchian says the magazine instantly outsold Sports Illustrated on Minneapolis newsstands, which led to it being rolled out nationally in 1994. Today, most people are probably more familiar with the name of the parent company, Fanball, which remains among the industry’s most prominent outlets for fantasy content and league hosting.

Charchian wasn’t new to fantasy football, either, when the magazine got started. His introduction to the game came more than a decade before, in 1979, when the seventh-grader made some rookie quarterback out of Morehead State his first fantasy selection ever. Although Phil Simms went on to throw nearly 200 touchdown passes and play for two Super Bowl-champion Giants teams, he completed just 50.6 percent of his passes that year for 13 touchdowns and 14 picks.

“Shows you what I knew,” says Charchian, who — as a Vikings fan — can’t even blame the choice on homerism.

Fortunately, he learned a few things over the years, and Charchian began to make a name for himself at the same time that his magazine was taking off. KFAN, a sports talk radio station in Minneapolis, began to bring him on as a guest in 1993 after Fantasy Football Weekly came out. By 1995, Charchian had his own weekend fantasy show, which today is the country’s longest-running fantasy program. Along the way, he also added a midweek video game show on KFAN, as well as pregame duties for the Vikings.

KFAN’s programming is no longer nationally syndicated, but its previous exposure as such and his offerings via Fanball helped to turn Charchian into a national fantasy football figure. He has become known for developing new strategies, such as the “do the opposite” motto he still swears by. Whereas many fantasy owners will use the first few rounds to stock up on running backs, Charchian recommends following the method that he attributes to George Costanza and going after the top guys at quarterback and receiver before turning your attention to backs.

His latest venture stands apart from the actual game of fantasy, though, and looks to capitalize on the money fantasy owners put into their leagues. LeagueSafe.com takes on the burden of collecting league fees, delivering end-of-season payouts and going after deadbeat owners (nonviolently), and its recent launch claims much of Charchian’s time these days. Of course, it doesn’t claim enough to keep him away from the fun side.

FantasyVictory.com is the content arm of LeagueSafe, and Charchian also supplies weekly video for OpenSports.com.

“It’s fun staying on the content side,” he says.

Lest anyone worry that he’s too busy these days, Charchian assures that his attention to football detail hasn’t lapsed.

“If you’re going to keep up with it you’ve gotta keep up with it,” he says, conceding that the time crunch means some of the other stuff might slip.

So what is the other stuff for someone who started playing fantasy 29 years ago? One would think he’d be at least knee-deep in all the basic sports, but Charchian says that after football, his favorite fantasy leagues are actually golf, movies and “American Idol.”

The movie league scores pretty simply, with the winner in each of the year’s three seasons being the player whose movies grossed the most at domestic box offices. The Idol league lets owners add a contestant a week and score on a weekly basis with more points awarded for contestants who have been on the roster longer.

Most importantly, all of the various work he has done in the industry and the increased corporatization of fantasy — “It’s definitely more of a business,” he says. “It feels like more of a business” — haven’t soured Charchian at all toward the games that first drew him in.

Tags: american idol, fanball, fantasy football, fantasy football weekly, fantasy golf, fantasy movies, fantasy sports, fantasy sports business, fantasy sports industry, fantasyvictory.com, kfan, leaguesafe, minnesota vikings, open sports, paul charchian, phil simms

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