– When Rob went to Naples, I was the only full-timer from Lawrence who went with him (I had been the Journal-World’s online sports editor — running KUsports.com and “Game” — for 2.5 years at that point). Ellyn and Ira had been interns working with myself on “Game” the summers of 2004 and 2005. We were all full-time employees in Naples, but not so in Lawrence. The rest of the team that stayed in Lawrence (everyone Jeff mentioned, plus online editors Dave Toplikar and Phil Cauthon) was and is an incredibly talented group that continues to do wonderful work there or elsewhere.

– Just to clarify, Tim was in Naples months before any of us arrived, and Nick came from New York, not from Lawrence. Yes, he had been an employee of the television station in Lawrence while we were there, but he had taken a job in New York well before our leaving for Naples happened. As for Dan Cox, I know that Dan is smart enough to make his own decisions, so saying Rob “tried to take” him puts responsiblity/blame on shoulders where it doesn’t belong. (On a similar note, saying Rob is “taking” people from WPNI to the Sun — or any previous changing of jobs — is a bit disingenuous. All of us have made our own decision on if we wanted to go to Las Vegas, stay at WPNI or find a job somewhere else entirely.)

– Had I not gone to Naples with Rob, Ellyn and Ira, I don’t think I would have stayed at the Journal-World much longer, either. The KUsports.com job is an incredibly fulfilling one, but it’s also one that requires a tremendous amount of time and effort to do properly to meet the demands and expectations of the KU fan base. I left the Journal-World for Naples as much because it was an opportunity to move out of Kansas for the first time in my life and experience somewhere and something new as to continue working with Rob and the others who went. I loved working for the Simons family and with everyone else at the Journal-World, but it was rapidly approaching my time to leave before I became a townie

– More on Rob “taking” us when he left Naples for the Post: I left completely of my on volition. While I loved the people I worked with in Naples and the work I was doing there, I was having a hard time living in the town itself (a pale-skinned, redheaded computer dork doesn’t really become friendly with sunlight and beaches) and saw Rob’s departure as an opportunity for myself to move somewhere that was more my style. I had contacts at various publications and organizations in the area and would have been just fine even if I hadn’t ended up working with Rob again. I can’t speak for Tim or Ira, but saying Tim immediately left is at least technically wrong as he didn’t start at the Post until a couple months after Rob had started there. I also can’t speak for the other people who left Naples more recently, though I have to imagine that they wouldn’t have left Naples if they (still) greatly enjoyed it there. Blaming Rob (or anyone) for them leaving seems to be a stretch.

– I can’t speak for the Naples newsroom since I didn’t work on the print side there and our online team was in a different building, but when it came to sharing and working together in Lawrence (where I was on the print side for 4+ years before taking the online sports editor job), sharing and working together was the usual MO, with very few problems. Many print reporters were happy to go on camera or blog, many TV anchors and reporters were happy to do online chats, podcasts or blogs, and online editors were happy to write items for print (we would have done TV stuff too, if we’d been photogenic enough to be wanted for it)

– I don’t know exact revenue numbers, but I’m 99.9 percent sure that sites/projects in Lawrence were (and are) making money, and I think Naples was doing pretty well financially also, though that was every bit as much to do with having a publisher (John Fish) who was a master salesman and a hard-working ad staff as anything Rob did, if not more (which I’m sure he would readily admit).