The long silence and eventual shuttering of the Fantasy Football Open Championship left plenty of players with questions and anger. It left Aaron Wine, however, with an idea.

Wine said he played the contest through both seasons of its existence and loved it (no doubt helped by coming in eighth overall in 2008). At the same time, he had been working his way down an entrepreneurial path that has him near completion on a master’s degree in business.

“I’ve been looking to expand my business knowledge and ability, and I thought go for it,” Wine told FSB.com recently.

In this case, “going for it” meant launching the Progressive Fantasy Football World Championship.

Wine said he began putting the contest together in late April on a hunch that the FFOC would not be returning, and it has certainly been a case of learning on the fly.

Before his site went live, Wine set up PFFWC forums to start getting word out about his game and interact with potential users. It was in that stage that he revealed his plan for a “progressive” prize structure — one that initially would have fallen short of qualifying as legal under the UIGEA.

The line there is that any fantasy contest must set a guaranteed prize amount (no matter how many entries there end up being), with the ability to grow the payout level as the field of entrants expand. The initial plan with the PFFWC was to tie the prize level directly to the number of players.

That’s the kind of thing you’d like to see ironed out before a game is public instead of pointed out in the forums, but Wine’s style since going public with the concept has been one of openness and feeling his way. That might be unsettling to some considering whether to invest their money. Others with confidence shaken by recent questionable practices in the high-stakes space might have an easier time trusting a more transparent operation such as this one.

Either way, the legal stuff got sorted out, and the PFFWC lauched with a $100 entry fee (similar to the FFOC) and a guaranteed top prize of $3,500 that can grow with more entries. League winners pocket $200. The contest also follows the same scheduling format as the FFOC.

Wine said the break-even point for his first season would come at 450 teams purchased, mostly covering the cost for programming. He says his operating costs will decrease significantly after in year two, however, because he’ll own all of the technology used to run the drafts and the contest after having it custom built. His background as a database administrator and user interface expert has come in handy in the development phase and will no doubt continue to be important to his operation.

As of mid-June, Wine had 30 teams purchased, with a round of commercials scheduled to run in ESPN in the Dallas, San Antonio and Austin markets. (So residents shouldn’t be alarmed if they see this guy.) The first live draft took place this week.

It’ll be interesting to see what kind of customer base the PFFWC can drum up in a segment of the fantasy market that has gotten more crowded lately. The short window in which Wine went from idea to live game also makes his venture interesting to observe. Many others take much more time for development, testing and everything else that goes into launching a new business.

However it goes, he’s definitely heading in with the proper mindset.

“I’m not looking to get rich,” he said. “I’m here to start a business and have fun doing it.”

What many have expected throughout the fantasy industry since January has become official.

Visitors to the Fantasy Football Open Championship’s website are now met with this message:

Dear FFOC Players:

We want to thank all of you who have played in our leagues over the past two seasons. It is with great regret that we have decided to shut the game down for the upcoming 2010 season. This was a difficult decision to make, but in the end our only choice given the present, difficult economic environment and the unavoidable delay in coordinating the 2010 draft. While disappointed, we feel that this is the best decision for everyone. Thanks for all your kind words and support, and we hope that we offered some excitement over the past 2 years.

For the 136 teams that won their leagues, the $180.00 cash prize will be sent to you within thirty (30) days, as we are in the process of coordinating these payments. To assist in this process, please send written notification of your current address to: Poised to Stomp Sports, Inc. c/o Kasowitz, Benson, Torres & Friedman, LLP, 1441 Brickell Avenue, Suite 1420, Miami, Florida 33131. Good luck to all of you as you pursue your fantasy sports dreams.

The Retraction

Additionally, there is ostensibly some confusion over previous, mistaken posts. Contrary to any statements or representations that may have been previously made, Fanball has no involvement, ownership or liability in the financial risks or awards of FFOC’s contests. We apologize to Fanball and Ryan Houston for any resulting confusion and inconvenience. We have enjoyed a great working relationship with Fanball, and wish them continued success.

This should surprise no one after rumors flying about the FFOC not paying out winnings, co-founder Stan Mistios removing his “gag of silence” only to promise an announcement that has just now been delivered and contradicting public messages about the contest’s ownership structure (hence, the retraction above). Additionally, the Fantasy Players Association broke the news over the weekend of FFOC parent company Poised to Stomp becoming “inactive” in the state in which it registered.

The FFOC debuted two years ago with Jerry Rice as its celebrity face and a historical grand prize. The ratio of entry fee to grand prize threw up red flags for business folks throughout the industry right away. For fantasy players, though, the contest did at least serve as an accessible, big-prize tournament for those seeking the challenge without the four-figure cost.

The FFOC’s creation and fall has inspired at least one of its contestants to launch his own entry in the national-contest field, a venture about which we’ll provide more details in the coming days.

It’s been nine days now since Fantasy Football Open Championship co-founder Stan Misthios shed the “gag of silence” and promised to address the future of his event “in a few short days.”

No announcement has yet come from the FFOC.

What has come, however, is the apparent locking down of new posts to the FFOC message boards. A poster on the Fantasy Players Association website mentioned Thursday night in the FPA forums that the site was not allowing new posts. Indeed, when FSB.com checked on Friday afternoon, the same “Thank you for posting” message arose without ever allowing for material to be entered.

Misthios’ language in his previous announcement seemed optimistic, but the longer that odd circumstances such as this and the apparent dispute over FFOC ownership persist, the more consumers have to wonder about any future for the contest.

Since the end of the Fantasy Football Open Championship’s second season, FSB.com has heard some negative rumors about the operation and some significant doubts about its continuation in 2010. We’ve held back on posting anything about it here because confirmation and even specific information from 2009 players have been hard to come by.

It turns out, there might be a pretty good reason why we didn’t hear more.

In a Wednesday post on the FFOC message boards, co-owner Stan Misthios said he’s been under a “gag of silence” this off-season and that the FFOC will be announcing something in the next few days.

His full post reads:

FFOC players,

It has been an interesting off season for the FFOC, and it is nice to finally have the ‘gag of silence’ removed and be able to reach out to you with this brief message.

Various ‘negotiations’ prevented myself, or any of my other partners at FFOC from publicly addressing that which was going on behind the scenes. Its feels good to be able to speak to all of you again. I will be back on this board and on my blog in just a few short days to address the future of the contest, and the 2010 season.

The nature of this post would seem to point to some change in the ownership and/or operation of the event that will allow it to move forward. If the “future” were simply going to be it’s ending, it would seem odd to tease that announcement ahead of time — especially with a relatively rosy post.

We’ll see, of course, what is actually happening as soon as that information is made public. Whatever happens with the contest that jumped out by awarding fantasy football’s first million-dollar prize should be interesting.

For what it’s worth, Misthios did provide a few other details later in that thread in replies to other posters:

In response to comment that the FFOC appeared to be under Fanball control: “FFOC still a property of Poised To Stomp.”

Explaining why he has been unable to speak out: “FFOC is not a sole proprietorship, so I had to respect the wishes of my partners.”

In response to a consumer’s concerns about trusting a contest to pay out winnings:”Yes, there was an issue about money, but it was NOT about money the way you might be thinking, or are referring to. I can’t give those details at this exact time, but in time I will.”