Burning Blue: Meet Dallas' Newest Professional E-Sports Team
DALLAS (CBSDFW.COM) - The Dallas Fuel is the newest professional sports team in Dallas/Fort Worth.
What makes the Fuel different is that they are a professional e-sports team. That's right, they play a video game. And they are paid to do it.
Dallas is one of 12 franchises that is participating in the inaugural season of the Overwatch League. Some of the other "homes" of Overwatch League teams include Boston, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, Houston, Shanghai and London.
The regular season started in January.
There are four stages to the season, leading up to the playoffs in which the top four teams will compete for the Overwatch League Trophy and a $1,000,000 bonus.
Founding Fuel owner Mark Rufail is a former professional gamer, who started the team as a college student in North Carolina.
The reason Rufail moved the team to Dallas is simple: he's a native Texan and a huge fan of all the DFW sports teams. Now, he joins the larger than life personas of owners trying to bring a title to Dallas.
When asked how he might compare to the likes of Jerry Jones and Mark Cuban, Rufail replied, "We are bringing our own style... I think the way we do things is Dallas-centric."
The Fuel's headquarters are housed at Victory Plaza in the shadows of the American Airlines Center. Right now, that's the only thing Dallas about the team.
That's because not one of the Fuel's games will be played in Dallas this season.
In fact, all league games are being played at the custom-designed Blizzard Arena in the Burbank Studios just outside Los Angeles.
The mission of the league is that all 12 franchise establish a home arena by 2020.
Rufail is confident the Fuel will play "home" games in DFW within the next two years. He even thinks there's a chance that the team will have a home facility by next season.
The Fuel may not call Dallas home yet, but they already have a strong following. They have over 80,000 followers on the team's official twitter account @DallasFuel that uses #BurnBlue.
Over 500 fans showed their support of the Fuel at a watch party at Mac's Southside in Downtown Dallas in January.
"They showed up so big and loud," Rufail said, describing Fuel Fans. "One thing about e-sports fans that people don't know is they are more supportive than other sports teams fans are."
To give Fuel fanatics something to cheer about, Rufail is building a fan-friendly team. "When you ask about personality, our team is known to be the most prolific team with personality. We have really big personalities."
Big on personalities, but light on victories.
The Fuel stumbled in the opening weeks of the season, winning only three of their first 10 matches.
With stage two of the season set to start this week, Rufail thinks the team can turn things around and compete. "Our goal is to win championship titles," he said.
And there's nothing more "Dallas-Centric" than a local owner putting pressure on his team to win it all.
CBSDFW.com has created "Burning Blue" to provide weekly updates on the team.
