I wouldn't call the 3 year plan 'fake it till you make it'.
Remember, there were no 'national leagues' at the time - just individual promoters, some of whom had a circuit.
The general idea was that NPPL would be a rules and oversite organization, hiring promoters (not that it turned out that way); we had 28 teams that travelled the country. With our attendance, ANY promoter would 'make it', without, they wouldn't even be able to 'fake it'.
We had to first figure out what rules we wanted (I wish the whole meeting had been recorded; the 'I'll accept a rule to deal with my preferred method of cheating if you accept a rule to deal with your preferred method of cheating' session was LEGENDARY. The request to include pantyhose in the allowed clothing category and the ensuing 'discussion' were worth the price of admission alone...)
How many events, where, how many refs, how to train refs, scoring systems, seeding, ranking, series points - these were all serious issues that needed at least a season to sort out.
Then we looked at the paintball community. We knew that store and field traffic was down in a local area near a major event - how would we go about getting 'all' paintballers to visit the event on a given weekend.
After all, if we couldn't get our own people to an event, what made us think we had a hope of getting the great unwashed public there?
This is where the 'plan' began to fall apart. No one wanted to spend any serious time on marketing, and some of the 'promoters' we 'hired' were reluctant to spend dollars on speculation. Since the NPPL had already lost control of the cash flow by year two, and marketing was reduced to me making 600 to 1200 worth of phone calls a month (with no promise of recompense).....
We had ideas on the table - a free trade show section for local stores and fields, incentives in the form of free entry tickets to local businesses, that sort of thing.
Since I knew that outside interest would only really respond if it looked like the league had a 'following' (presumably the non-tournament playing paintballers), there was no point in trying to bring those folks in.
I'll say this knowing that the statement itself will bring charges of bias: I was fortunate enough this year to be able to attend PSP Orlando and NPPL Tampa almost back to back. The differences were dramatic.
NPPL 'looked' professional. PSP looked 'lost' in the parking lot. NPPL's trade show was hopping and crowded, with smiling vendors in attendance. PSP's trade show was quiet, until they turned on the sound system right next to the scoring and scheduling tent, rendering it impossible to talk there. The only real activity was at the backend of the paint trailers.
All of the teams at NPPL seemed excited to be there. Several of the five player teams at PSP complained to me (unsolicited) that they felt like they were an afterthought. Likewise, some of the vendors complained to me that they'd been stuck out in the hinterlands.
Scheduling at NPPL was crisp, at PSP it was lackluster. Attendance of non players at NPPL was obvious, at PSP, almost non-existent. (The college parents in attendance also had a thing or two to say - things like 'this is what they get for their money'? - which were followed by my explanations of NCPA having to piggyback on other events and therefore was not really responsible: all Raehl discussions aside, I really believe in college ball and wish it were better supported.)
All in all, if I were an outsider looking to get involved, I'd be more attracted by the NPPL and its energy and the obvious enthusiasm of the fans.
It may be that in the long run, paintball tournaments will have to embrace a variety of formats and competitions (much like some of the extreme sports festivals) in order to really reach its audience - and paintball hasn't really decided yet whether it wants to come across as a 'traditional' sport or an 'extreme' sport.
