Welcome to Niners Nation!

Welcome to all fans of the red and gold.  My name is David Fucillo but my friends call me Fooch.  As a life-long 49ers fan I felt obligated to help spread the word as this team ascends back to greatness.  Thanks to SportsBlogs, Inc, I can now do that on a daily basis.

My goal here is to keep you informed of and entertained by all things 49er.  The team has shown vast improvement this year, making for an exciting time in the Bay Area.

Although I'm not originally from the Bay Area, I've been a 49ers fan since childhood.  I was born and grew up in Las Vegas.  Obviously there was no NFL team to support.  Since it was the mid 80s, the 49ers were one of the most successful teams and being a mere 5 or 6 years old, I latched on to the bandwagon of the best team.  

So yes, I started out as a bandwagon fan.  However, I've remained a fan to this day, through the ups of the 1994 Super Bowl, to the downs of the Dennis Erickson era.  I lived in Saudi Arabia during middle school (due to my dad's job) and I still remember sitting in my dining room listening to the Armed Forces Network broadcast of the 49ers-Giants NFC championship.  The Gulf War had started at that point and we had an air raid siren going off.  We were relatively safe though so I sat there in my gas mask listening to the 49ers lose a heart-breaker.

So fast-forward to the present.  I started a 49ers blog in October at blogspot.com (sf49ers.blogspot.com) with the hope of eventually being able to run the 49ers blog at SB Nation.  Well, thanks to Saint (http://www.silverandblackpride.com), I was able to make this happen.

This blog is meant to be a community to create an on-going dialogue about all things team-related.  All opinions are allowed, as long as respect is shown towards others.  You can use this site to rant and rave about Kwame Harris's inability to block the pass rush, or you can provide evidence for why the 49ers should ONLY use zone blitzes on 3rd and long.  

The beauty of SB Nation is the diaries on the right side of the front page.  You will have the opportunity to post your thoughts and opinions about the 49ers for all to see.  It becomes a veritable blog-within-a-blog.  I've posted an introductory diary, further explaining this.

So while anybody is welcome, there are a couple simple rules:

1. Show respect towards other people - Trash talking is allowed but try not to get too childish when you disagree with someone's opinion.   More importantly this includes no use of anything tacist or otherwise.  I don't care how old you are or what your issue is, there's no use for that here and you will be banned if the issue does come up.  Additionally, if an opposing team's fan posts something you don't like, feel free respond.  However don't ask for someone to be banned because they were talking trash about the 49ers.

2. Keep the political chatter out - This is not a political website and is not meant for political discussions.  The only exception to this is politics that affect the 49ers, such as stadium issues and the city naming issue that has come up.  This is not the website to post your feelings about the war in Iraq or the 2008 presidential election.

3. Profanity isn't banned, but it is discouraged - You should be able to say what you think without dropping f-bombs every other word.  However, free speech is free speech so if you feel the need to curse out John York, try and warn people first.  The only time I would expect to use f-bombs is if the 49ers were to lose a playoff-game on a last second field goal!

Other than that, I expect to have a lot of fun with this. The team is playing well and the fanbase is getting energized. Oh and be prepared because I plan stumping for the drafting of Dwayne Jarrett until April! And remember, THERE'S NOTHIN FINER THAN BEING A 49ER!