By Jeff Thomas

The split with Fanball is just a bump in the road for Charlie Wiegert. He’ll be back, although he’ll probably spend more time on the beach and with his family. He deserves it.

I have a unique view of Charlie’s career — as a long-time competitor. Ali and Frazier? Maybe not, but we’ve been in the ring together more than once.

Charlie and his partners launched CDM about nine months before I opened Sports Buff in the early 90’s. We battled often for game-management deals and watched a long, long list of competitors come and go. CDM actually made an offer to purchase Sports Buff in 1999. It didn’t work out, but I was able to get to know Charlie better during the process. He’s a great guy, he loves this industry, and he has worked hard to help it grow and prosper.

His contributions are extensive. In fact, most current industry operators have no idea how extensive. Even before the FSTA was created, Charlie organized meetings in St. Louis to begin the communication process between companies in a very young industry. He and CDM invested heavily and led efforts to help clarify legal and licensing issues, years before the FSTA or the MLBAM lawsuit. Without these early efforts, many of today’s content companies and game operators — small, medium and large — would not exist.

He has followed that up with 12 years of devotion to the FSTA Board, continuing to contribute to industry growth for a second decade.

This is an odd set of events with Fanball. I think Fanball is in trouble. Charlie’s not. He’ll be fine.

(Jeff Thomas is an 18-year veteran of the fantasy sports industry, fellow founding member of the FSTA — for which he served a three-year term as president — and CEO of World Fantasy Games, which owns and operates this site.)

Pretty much any time an employee parts with a company, it’s at least significant for someone. In this case, though, the split is significant for an industry.

Charlie Wiegert, a founder of CDM Fantasy Sports nearly 20 years ago, will officially part ways with Fanball on Tuesday.

“Charlie’s impact on the industry is hard to overstate,” said Paul Charchian, another industry veteran and president of the Fantasy Sports Trade Association. “His 20-plus years of effort have helped define pay game contests. He’s supported the industry through work on the FSTA, sponsorships of industry events, and helping countless employees.”

After 17 years in newspaper ad sales — much of which was also spent competing in fantasy leagues — Wiegert helped found CDM Fantasy Sports in 1991. That company quickly became a leading games operator, running fantasy contests for media partners and other sports outlets. CDM was acquired in August 2006 by FUN Technologies, by then also the parent company of Fanball.

“I have really enjoyed the past 19 years in this industry, and look forward to having some time off,” Wiegert told FSB.com. “I do not have any plans for the future yet, but do plan on staying active in the industry, still writing my blog — godfatheroffantasysports.com — and remaining as treasurer of the FSTA.”

Of course, the most impactful segment of Wiegert’s career came in the courtroom. That was where his company — in CBC v. Major League Baseball Advanced Media — assured fantasy operators everywhere the right to use player names and statistics in their games without having to pay rights fees to the leagues involved.

“Winning the lawsuit with MLBAM/MLBPA was the highlight of my career, and knowing that fantasy sports games will remain in the hands of game operators instead of the leagues is very satisfying,” Wiegert said. “Most fantasy sports players do not realize that the games they play and love would have been changed and/or eliminated without a positive decision.”

Charchian added: “CDM’s successful battle with MLBAM saved the industry from monopoly by the leagues.”

We here at FSB.com wish Charlie the best of luck in whatever he decides to do next.

More: Jeff Thomas shares thoughts on Wiegert’s impact on the fantasy sports industry.

(Note: Although Charchian co-founded Fanball, he has no affiliation with the company at this point.)

We all know that court decisions in favor of fantasy game providers tired of paying licensing fees for player statistics and information are good for those who put on the games. The flipside, though, is that NFL Players Inc. is out at least $3.5 million so far, according to a recent report.

Sports Business Journal reported Monday that the NFL Players Association’s annual report for the fiscal year ending Feb. 28 found revenues from fantasy licensing fees down to $1.2 million from $4.7 million in the previous year. That number figures to tumble even further going forward — particularly once the Yahoo! lawsuit is resolved.

According to SBJ, Yahoo! accounted for more than half of last year’s total, shelling out $841,329 in licensing fees to the NFLPA. CBS Sports, on the other hand, dropped from $1.49 million in the previous fiscal year to just $55,000 for “player appearances” last year. CBS reportedly stopped paying licensing fees before filing suit last fall against the players association.

Among the other big names: Fox Sports’ payout dipped just to $276,218 from $363,876, with most of the remaining money reportedly going to cover LaDainian Tomlinson’s role as spokesperson for Fox’s fantasy football. Sporting News, which said it did pay for a license last year, nevertheless dropped from $73,805 in fee spending to $50,000. Sporting News Online vice president and general manager Jeff Gerttula said he didn’t know what the company would do “going forward,” in light of the series of court rulings that deem such licenses unnecessary.

According to SBJ, the exact size of the revenue drop for NFL Players — the merchandising wing of the NFLPA — is unknown because some companies pay similar fees as part of larger licensing deals that also cover other areas.

The choice by Yahoo! to file suit against the NFL Players Association in the same federal court circuit that has ruled favorably in two previous fantasy sports cases makes sense not only as a way to keep things on friendly ground, but also to avoid a Florida district that has been unkind in the past. An FSB.com review of the various court filings, however, suggests that the venue might not be as important as you’d think.

Obviously, the Eighth Circuit — which includes both the Minnesota district court that found for CBS and the eastern Missouri court in which the CBC case was filed — is the logical choice for any fantasy company logging such a licensing challenge.

On the other hand, a 2000 suit brought by Gridiron.com against the NFLPA in the southern district of Florida ended with a ruling in favor of the NFLPA’s licensing rights. The fact that the NFLPA chose this same district in which to file a countersuit last year against CBS makes it clear that the group likes its chances there based on that Gridiron.com ruling.

That countersuit, of course, was swept out as part of the decision in CBS’ favor back in March — which remains under appeal - so we won’t know how the Florida court might have ruled this time around. The key difference, though, is that the Gridiron.com case centered on the use of player likenesses — photos — whereas those since have made official mention only of player statistics and information.

In the 2000 suit, Gridiron.com apparently signed contracts with “over one hundred and fifty” NFL players for the rights to their likenesses in its fantasy football game and posited that it didn’t need to pay licensing fees to the NFLPA for those rights. The NFLPA — which had specific exclusive licensing deals with about 97 percent of the league’s players at the time — had little trouble defeating that notion in court.

The decision says only that Gridiron.com could not use six or more player photos without owing fees to the NFLPA and makes no specific mention of player stats or biographical or other info. The filings submitted by CBC, CBS and Yahoo, however, make no specific mention of player likenesses and instead focus on stats and information.

The 2007 ruling in CBC’s favor against MLB Advanced Media was appealed all the way up to the Supreme Court, which refused to even hear the appeal in 2008, thus upholding the decision. The CBS case decided back in March reached the same result, finding that the fantasy sports producer doesn’t owe licensing fees for the use of stats and player information. Although the appeal remains outstanding in that case, it’s tough to imagine a reversal in light of the CBC precedent.

Now, I have slightly less legal training than Sam Waterston, but the precedential groundwork laid by those two cases would seem to make it hard for an opposite ruling in any similar suit to stand through appeal — if it were even handed down in the first place. If the Supreme Court isn’t even willing to review the decision that player statistics and information reside in the free public forum, what grounds do south Florida judges or any others have to say otherwise?

The exclusive rights to player photos make sense. An individual should be able to benefit from profits related to use of his or her likeness. The facts, however, are free. Maybe a ruling to that effect in the Yahoo! case will end assertions to the contrary.

(Note: Hat tip to loyal FSB.com reader Randal Burgess for calling the Gridiron.com case to our attention.)