Hello! Welcome Back to Archives of Fabella daily. The only podcast that’s about to tell quidditch to “Hold my beer.” Today is March 28th, equal to Aries 8th. Books are available on Amazon. Please rate and review the podcast on iTunes or wherever you listen to your podcasts and hit that subscribe button for more great stories right in your feed.
March 28th, 1913 is remembered by history as the date The car factory at Cowley, Oxfordshire, where the BMW MINI Cooper automobile is now manufactured, turned out its very first car. Morris Motors opened Britain’s first motor vehicle assembly line to produce the Morris Oxford, nicknamed the “bullnose”. Celebrating 100 years of continuous operation in 2013, Plant Oxford is the oldest assembly plant globally.
On Fabella, a troll created the most popular sport in the world.
I’m Dillon Foley, and this is Archives of Fabella.
Beyond our world, there is love
Beyond our world, there is war
Beyond our world, there is life
Beyond our world, there is Fabella.
Aries 8th, 5913 FY Fabella Year equal to March 28th, 1913 AD Earth Year
For a sport that ultimately became a favorite pastime across the world, the game of Looseball had a very dark beginning. The sport came of age alongside many other games in the Domination Age of Fabella, out of the Bloodborne Empire’s desire to distract the populace through celebration.
When a troll by the name of Barney Bennet ascended to Head of the Bureau of Games and Sports, he was charged with the arduous task of creating popular sport to overshadow the cultural games played by Fabellans in the past. The Empire’s goal was to distract the public and further eliminate any shred of cultural identity Fabellans still clung to.
Plenty of former heads of the BGS had attempted to design a new sport with no success. This wasn’t a job meant to bring any kind of pride or joy to whoever sat behind the desk. It was a place higher superiors in Imperial command sent their political rivals to embarrass them.
Barney had made a lot of enemies in his political career, but he wasn’t going to let being sent to the Island of Misfit Toys get him down, no, sir. When Barney Bennet took the post as head of the Bureau of Games and Sport, it was to prove all his political opponents wrong. This would not be a place where he’d be destined to languish in squalor and humiliation; he would bring prestige to the post, and that — he hoped — would be enough to welcome him into Emperor Chronos’s inner circle.
The Bureau oversaw several sports in Fabella:
Weightbearing was just lifting a lot of weight on your back. It broke a gross amount of spines. It wasn’t unheard of for winners to die on the mat.
Roughhousing was the most popular sport, with wizards being forced to duel each other in a ring using various hexes. The sport didn’t have mass appeal, though, and the Empire wanted to diminish the magical population. So that was out.
Running events were also popular among a specific group of people but not open to mass appeal.
Volleyball had been around ever since the Dynasty Age and so ingrained in the Republic of Fantasia’s cultural identity that the Empire sought to eliminate the sport.
Acrobatics were thrilling to watch but seen by males as being too feminine.
Barney Bennet tried and tried to think of a new sport, one that would be exciting, different, and garner mass audiences. He thought about his childhood, where he played a children’s game with his brother, sort of like a hot potato. They would toss a dragon’s egg back and forth to each other. Whoever held the egg when the baby dragon hatched would be the loser. This concept had already been integrated into the sport of Bat Back, featuring players using rackets for batting a dragon’s egg over a net. But the more Barney thought about the game; he realized there might be something there.
Over the next few months, Barney began jotting down his ideas for the sport of Looseball.
Looseball would be played on a 100-yard field with a set of twelve players on either side in one of three positions: Offensive line, defensive line, and scorers.
Players on the offensive and defensive lines were tasked with getting the ball down the field to their endzones. No player in these positions could hold the ball for longer than three seconds. Quick passing, kicking, punting, head butts, and tackling were permitted. Inadmissible was any form of magic, including potions.
Scorers would stand in the endzones waiting to catch the ball passed or kicked by their teammates on the field. A scorer had to catch the ball to record a point. The ball had to be airborne for a point to be scored. A player couldn’t just roll the ball into the endzone to their scorer.
Teams could arrange their players in any combination they wished; there just had to be at least one person in each position.
The game ended when time ran out. In the case of a tie, the game would go into sudden-death overtime.
Barney spent a significant amount of time trying to imagine what would constitute a foul or result in a pause of gameplay. Any tactics to delay the game certainly couldn’t be allowed. The overly aggressive play was also a concern of his, even though the Empire would love it if players were allowed to beat up their rivals. Barney also decided to limit the defensive line to their half of the field. Offensive line people were allowed full use of the field.
Barney also struggled with the name. “Looseball” sounded amateurish and unimaginative. He wrote it down as a working name, figuring that future Barney would come up with a better moniker that never materialized. Little by little, the term “Looseball” started to grow on him.
The next order of business was to test the game. Barney found two coaches open to learning how to play and assembled referees. They then held several practice sessions with players recruited by the coaches. These practice sessions were slow because Barney had to keep blowing his whistle to stop the game and explain a foul or a new rule he made up on the fly.
The first practice games were played without protective gear, but as players kept experiencing injuries to their elbows and knees, he realized pads were necessary. After several players suffered concussions from being kicked the head, Barney delegated his Bureau into designing lightweight helmets.
Looseball players came in all sorts of shapes and sizes. The typical offensive linesperson was a sprinter able to run for long periods of time and beat their way up and down the field without breaking a sweat. Defensive line people were thickly built with broad shoulders, chests, and powerful arms. Barney had to make punching a foul because defensive line people in the practice session were smashing their fists into opponents’ faces to secure possession of the ball. Scorers were short, fast, and had impeccable eyesight. A scorer had to be able to track the ball through the air to make a complete catch.
After every point scored, an offensive line person from the rival team would perform a punt to their teammates from the opposite endzone. The game usually stopped because of a foul or timeout. Coaches had five two-minute timeouts they could use throughout the game. They could also sub players in and out during the game without calling a timeout as long as they kept the same formation they started the game with. After coaches kept pulling and adding players to the offensive line or defensive line depending on where the ball was, Barney decided to split the game into two halves. Teams had to stick with the same formation they began the half with. Team captains were usually the ones to throw the ball back into play after a foul, timeout, or if the ball went out of bounds.
On Aries 8th, the first official game of Looseball was played between the Purple Chimeras and the Golden Dragons. A crowd of 150 people sat on wooden bleachers to watch the Chimera’s triumph with a score of 28-16.
Looseball wasn’t an overnight success by any means. Barney had to keep working at it until the end of his life. Still, the game gradually expanded to become Fabella’s number one sport, and Barney Bennet was heralded as the father of Fabella’s favorite pastime.
That’s going to do it for us today. Tune in tomorrow for the story of a spellbook with a dark background. Subscribe now to get more new episodes right in your feed. Rate and review the podcast on iTunes or wherever you listen to podcasts. Send your questions to archivesoffabella@gmail.com.
Archives of Fabella is created, produced, and hosted by Dillon Foley with music by Garret Ferris and Audioblocks. Books are available on Amazon in ebook and paperback, as always, “Look outside of what is possible and think about what might be.”