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Mississippi State

Why I decided to move to On3

3rupauk8_400x400by: Robbie Faulk01/01/24RobbieFaulkOn3
09-02-2023-SELUvsMSU-Pregame-jared_thomas-1
Photo by Jared Thomas, On3

Loyalty is something that has always been important to me.

My incredible grandmother passed away last year, and her best years had fleeted her prior to that, but she always lived by the motto, “bloom where you’re planted.” It sounds a little oxymoronic for me to talk about loyalty when I’m now working for my third network in 10 years on the Mississippi State beat, but I’ll explain.

Back in 2013, I wasn’t really sure what life had in store for me. I was a senior at State and was spending most of my time working an unpaid internship with the Athletic Department hoping for a job in sports information upon graduation. That’s when an email came across through my professor, Dr. John Forde, that was searching for someone to become a Senior Writer covering MSU for Rivals.com.

It wasn’t public relations, but I knew plenty about Bulldog sports, I had a lot of experience writing and I had connections throughout the AD. How hard could it be? Turns our running a website by yourself is hard enough – balancing it with your final semester of college and first year of marriage was an even tougher thing.

From day one, Paul Jones was a sounding board for me. While we were technically competitors, I wasn’t really a threat to him and his years of experience in this business, but it still meant the world to me to have someone that was willing to help me through the ins and outs of building relationships in the business and covering recruiting.

Midway through my first year on the job, the publisher of the site ran out of money and voided my contract. I went from making over $2,000 a month to $500 a month while being tasked to put in the same work. Paul brought me on to 247Sports. The company could only promise me a $750 a month check to start, but Paul promised me that we would grow, and grow we did.

After coming on board in August of 2014, I spent four years with Paul building our site into one that made us both proud.

Paul and I helped breed a message board community that I’ve longed for over the course of the last few years. The merger of 247Sports and Scout brought us financial stability and page views and membership numbers that have never been seen on an MSU fan site, but that organic community that once existed has been missing from my heart.

We both had our ups and downs over the last few years but I’m proud of how we “bloomed where we were planted.” Those roots now shift to On3 and I’m happy to be back with such a great community of posters, many of which bring their own insight to the board that makes this place so special.

I’m excited to work with so many special insiders across the network. The heartbeat of network like this one resides in the people that bring the information, and On3 has the best collection of insiders and message board communities on the internet. That’s because of our leader and the innovator of this whole business, Shannon Terry.

I’m thankful Shannon had confidence in myself and Paul. Shannon brought us back under his leadership and it means the world to me that he believes we are the right people to get Maroon and White Daily going. There is not a person that  I trust more leading a company like this than Shannon Terry and his resume speaks for itself.

Over the course of our time here, Paul, myself and Tanner Marlar are going to help build the very best site that this fanbase has seen. We’re giving you a voice. We’re giving you a place to laugh, learn and talk MSU sports without any fear of censorship or banishment (within reason). You’re going to get our best every day and I’m excited for the ride.

The addresses change from time to time, but I always know where my home is. This is home.

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