I have to say I think this is pretty weak response. You're basically saying that no one on staff wants to do it, but you're not willing to bring in anyone new who might be willing to help you out. 
I'm not aware of too many successful organizations who's motto is "we know there's a problem, we understand your idea for improvements, but we're not going to do jack about it."
And I have to say that I don't give a **** what you think of my response Jman.
Seriously though, Chris gave you the polite response to this, but honestly I'm not here to sugar coat it... First it's not my place to bring on new staff to deal with the site. I've made suggestions in the past, but it's Chris' site and we genearlly had a forum over who came in and who went on staff. Do we feel like picking out who we think would gell with what's left of our staff? Do we feel like seeing who has the time/desire to put in the hardcore effort like Jeff did (because we're not gonna pick up a person to just do a story a week, that's for certain)?
Basically in a nutshell, no.
This isn't a for-profit organization here, so it's not like the staff's got the drive to make this "succeed" at this point. It's a lot of work to do what Jeff did... To replace him with one person is virtually impossible, and to replace him with multiple people is not going to happen. Why? Because getting one new guy involved and active is a pain. Starting from scratch isn't even close to reasonable then to the "old guard" here I think.
It's not that we don't want JD to succeed... We made it work for how long? We trumped a lot of sites with scoops/news, and like I pointed out our front page had images and stories up that are still there that other sites didn't have... Kinda funny that even with Jeff's departure and the downturn in the front page, we still had stories that beat the competition.
But the reality is that we are letting JD go gracefully because the guys that are still here care about the forum and the community, and I think we've collectively agreed the front page isn't important to us now. If it were, Jesse, Ryan, Paul, Rob, myself, Chris, and even Dale would be pitching in to make the front page better... It's kinda like customizing to me. I love it, but when do I do it? Never... It just isn't important to me right now. Jeff's leaving just kind of made this realization come about to the others I think, that's all.
The front page is a pretty key element to any site. I'm not really sure how the site is maintained financially, but if your sponsors are on the main page and people are bypassing to go right to the forums, that doesn't seem like a very wise strategy.
True, if you're competing... Right now the staff seemingly aren't interested in competing with other sites anymore though. I used to enjoy it, but really I'm bored with it, and again it all goes back to basically starting over, and how starting over just doesn't strike any of us as an option.
You can also say that you're "focusing" more on the forums, but I think that probably means you're just spending your time blogging like the rest of us. That will only last for so long before the majority of folks start migrating to more "active" sites. I personally have started hitting up other sites more often and I know others here who have done the same.
That's fine by me... I'm not going to beg people to stay here. I don't really have much drive to post anywhere but here, so that's why I stay. I have other forums I visit, but for SW I stick here. Will people leave? Probably... But others will come here to remain friends with who stay here, if they want. If the group becomes smaller I'm fine with that. I put my time in here, worked hard, and now I'm not doing so quite as much. I like chilling in the forums, and that's what I'll continue to do as part of the staff. If something comes up for me, I'll post it on the front page, but otherwise don't count on it changing much out there.
I'm no expert on running websites, but it seems pretty silly to me that you have an able group of supporters who might be interested in helping and you're not even giving it consideration. To Diddly's point - some news/any news on the front page is probably better than absolutely nothing.
Again... starting over, multiple new guys over 1 guy that does it all and enjoys it, blah blah blah... Chris has ultimate say on this, so if you guys really want to pester him to change JD, be my guest.
Like I've said, I don't mean to be a dick, but I don't get paid to do this, so what anyone really thinks of what I"m saying is going in one ear and out the other. There's few important people in the world to me, and even they couldn't sway my opinion on this right now. I loved JD, and still like the community here, but picking up the slack left by Jeff's departure is more than a guy pitching in for a news post here and there.
To be honest I think most people just don't understand the level of work that Jeff did, and that someone HAS to do, to keep a front page active, fresh, and to make it competitive. I'm talking getting good news ahead of the competition, exclusive news, etc. We've been one of the only sites that did that, and it's a major chore. Jeff's leaving is the equivalent of Curto leaving Scum, in every way. It would be devastating to their site as well.
Sorry guys... Doing it was fun while it lasted though!
