Teams must have at least 6 members at the time of Registration and can have no more than 10. At least 6 members are required to help preventing forfeits which ruins the night for everyone who is denied a match. Teams may add players to their roster through week 5 (up to a maximum of 10 players), with some restrictions (see the rules for specifics), so if you are starting a new team and want to pick up some more players, you have time to do that.
Once you have a team, you need to establish a home bar. If you are starting a new team at a bar that currently has teams in RDL, you need to ensure that the bar is aware that your team wishes to throw out of their bar, that the boards you plan to register on are available (not being used by another team), and that those boards have been inspected by an RDL board member ensuring that they meet RDL standards. If you are working with a bar already hosting RDL teams, someone at the bar should be familiar with this process and can help you.
If you are looking for a bar or are starting a team out of a bar that has never hosted before, there are a few more steps. To find a bar, you can contact the Membership Director who may have information on new bars looking for teams. At the very least, they can tell you which bars that hosted RDL teams in the last season had room for additional teams. At that point you would need to contract the bars. If you decide to throw out of one of them, follow the steps in the preceding paragraph to ensure you are ready to register.
If you decide on a bar that has not previously hosted teams for RDL, you should read the section “Bars Wanting to Host Teams” as your host establishment will have to follow RDL guidelines for setting up the dart area and be inspected. You may only register at bars that are located within fifteen (15) miles of the Raleigh, NC capitol building, “as the Crow flies”.
Typically, a few weeks before Registration the Membership Director begins to get inquiries from players about teams that are looking for players. They keep a roster of all players looking for teams, which they will make available at Registration. However, this varies greatly by season – some season there are multiple players looking, some seasons there are none. One recommendation is to attend blind draws (information for those is located on our website home page under “Weekly Blind Draws”, and also in the TONS of Newsletter). You can also post recruitment information on the dartboards at your home bar. If there are people at the bar who are playing a pick-up game, they obviously hang out at that bar and like darts; they may be interested in joining a team.