League Ground Rules:
1. Two trades per year (total, not per team) on the date of January 1st. With me taking a laissez faire approach but not wanting the cpu to do anything that isn't fair or doesn't make sense, I found this to be the best approach to trades.
2. Draft Classes Imported from DDSCB 3. I'll be playing that along side the FBL 1 in my own little college league, which I don't plan on doing a diary for but will if there are people who want it. Just saying, don't be surprised if there are weird picks for players out of either Temple (Hometown) OK State (Currently Attending) or Tennessee (DDSCB 3 league team)
3. No Favoring. It could be easy to do that when doing a league like this. I do tend to find favorite players and root for them, but no team gets special treatment. Just saying that in case some craziness happens.
4. (Diary Ground Rule) Podcast. It's going to be in the form of two guys hired by the league to do a monthly podcast, which I think is a nice idea and let's me talk in a Jalen and Jacoby kind of way.
Well, let's get it going!
)Summer Of 2000
Jake: What's up everybody!? Like, holy crap I can't believe we're doing this.
Ron: I'm right there with you bud. In case you didn't realize what you are listening to, it's the first rendition of the FBL 1 podcast. I'm Ron that lovable dork over there is Jake (Eh yo!), and we got hired by the new upstart league being started by our gagillionaire owner/commissioner of the league who also got 16 of his billionaire friends to buy teams and essentially stock in this new league.
Jake: It's just awesome. Now our awesome college players don't have to go overseas to make money off of this great sport, they can stay here in the good Ol' US of A. Not to say the European leagues are bad, just it's nice to keep our kids close to home. Maybe even bring some of the European children over here to entertain us and have tons of fun. I can't wait for the season to start!
Ron: Neither can I Jake. We're here in sunny Hollywood, Florida, in the FBL 1 headquarters, sweating our a@@%$ off to help you get excited for the inaugural season just like we are. Speaking of inaugural, our inaugural draft was just held to fill out the teams. We'll talk about that in a second but first Jake is going to break down this league a little bit for ya.
Jake: So the league is split up into two conferences, East and West, with eight teams each. Four teams make the playoffs per conference where they are seeded and play 7-game series against their conference opponents culminating in an East v West 7-game series to crown a winner. You knew that, but let's check out what cities ended up being represented:
East
Atlanta Eagles (GM- Giannia Antic)
Boston Irish (GM- Kaleb White)
Brooklyn Hoops (GM- Jackson King)
Charlotte Wasps (GM- Anthony Thompson)
Cleveland Knights (GM- Billy Nix)
Detroit Gears (GM- Mark King)
Indianapolis Racers (GM- Javier Morales)
Memphis Roar (GM- Bob Knight)
West
Denver Peaks (GM - Tom Thorn)
Houston Blast (GM- Terry Jackson)
Milwaukee Moose (GM- Ben Stevens)
LA Riders (GM- Taylor Bunstein)
OKC Twisters (GM- Tremond Wilson)
Phoenix Beams (GM- Niko Kasparov)
Seattle Speed (GM- Marco Vercetti)
Portland Pioneers (GM- Olijide Otunga)
Ron: Noticeably, Chicago isn't represented. Why is that?
Jake: To be honest... I don't know. It's one of the top basketball cities in the country and would have been great marketing wise. There's also no team in Philadelphia, or the rumored Las Vegas which I thought was a lock in getting a team. The owners put their teams where they wanted and all in all, we have a nice diverse group of areas in the league.
Ron: Agreed. Now for the last thing we do let's take a look at how the first round of the inagural draft went, and who these franchises decided to build their team around for the foreseeable future.
1. Houston Blast- SF Paul Muckle (1st player ever in the FBL 1!!!)
2. Portland Pioneers- PF Shawn Jones
3. Atlanta Eagles- SF Kris Dowling
4. Detroit Gears- PF Kirk Parker
5. Denver Peaks- C Marshall Lyons
6. Oklahoma City Twisters- SF Chad Swoger
7. Brooklyn Hoops- C Howie Price
8. Charlotte Wasps- PG Chris Stinson
9. Indianapolis Racers- SG Dante Henry
10. Phoenix Beams- PF Kenny Barrett
11. Memphis Roar- C Jason Finley
12. Cleveland Knights- SF Raymond Williams
13. Boston Irish- PG Jody Givens
14. Los Angeles Riders- PF Dustin Ward
15. Seattle Speed- PG Jarret Weaks (Weaks... face of Seattle -.-)
16. Milwaukee Moose- C Keith Pleick
Ron: And that's how the first round went, those are the first players in their respective franchises history. Those are the players that are going to lead their teams to the FBL 1 Championship for many years to come... or get booed out of the stadium cause they are garbage. You'll find out what we think of that and much more on our next podcast, October 30, 2000, our season preview podcast. For Jake, I'm Ron, have an all around awesome day.
