Locals makes High School football board game

A few weeks ago, the radio station named the top 50 Wimberley Texan Football athletes, leading into numerous opinions about who was left off and who made the team. Which really begs the question, which Wimberley State Champion was better? The 2005 Texans or the 2011 Texans.

This would seem like a rhetorical question that would lead into arguments by whichever team you were a part of or the year you graduated from high school.

Believe it or not, it can be statistically proven, and can be done by playing a new board game called “Friday Night Legends,” which pits a UIL Texas high school champ against another.

Chris Doelle, a local of Wimberley and founder of Lone Star Gridiron, is passionate about Texas High School Football. He is a marketing guru and knows how to utilize the internet. Together with his high school football passion, the board game all came about.

“We have data on every high school football team, some over 100 years. Along with my partner Mike Wright. He’s a stats guy, and you can tell a story from stats. It’s not a video game. We looked into it and board games are popular. Gaming cafes have tremendous growth. In fact some have called this period the Golden Age of board games,” Doelle said. Gaming cafes are where you go to play board games and pay a fee per hour to do it.

Currently to get the sales of the game started, they have a Kickstarter account to help with financing of the game.

“We have sold about 150 of the game and have just enough people for a Facebook group. Everyone has a great time playing it,” he said. They also offer to groups for fundraising activities.

Sealy High School and Eric Dickerson are on the 1978 team and 2010 Kerrville Tivy featuring Johnny Manziel can play against each other. “People can order specific years, we can do it,” Doelle said.

The game board, a 24-sided die, a 20-sided die, penalty charts, offense and defense cards, and team stats only, no individual players are included. Although at first the concept looks very challenging, it can be mastered very quickly.

“We’ve played over 200 rounds and know what works and what doesn’t work. It’s exciting, the fumbles and punt returns. The next step would be statistics on college football teams to make a college edition…if you find the stats, you can do,” Doelle said.

The game is in stores and available in Houston, Dallas and in Florida. “Friday Night Legends” has its own website: fridaynightlegends.com

The game is also available at Amazon.com.