Being a member of a fantasy basketball league is fun and exciting for sports fans. With a fantasy basketball team, you're the manager and owner of your own team. You can draft players, trade players or bench players, just like professional managers and owners do in real life. There is even a commissioner who makes sure that no one in the league cheats, and everyone plays according to the league rules.

Fantasy leagues have become an addiction. Before the professional season starts, millions of Americans sign up for fantasy leagues set up by different organizations. These leagues are organized and operated very much like professional basketball leagues. First, you are required to register your team. Generally, a league has 12 teams, although this is not a fixed rule. Some leagues can have as many as 20 teams.

As for your team itself, the roster size varies from league to league, though generally it's set at 14 players. Only nine players are allowed to start every week, and the remaining five stay in reserve, their points not counted.

Draft day is the most exciting day for fantasy leaguers. On draft day, each team is allowed to choose its stock of players, based on their individual performance. In this way, teams can choose several superstars playing different positions. However, draft rules make sure that each team manager in a league has a fair chance, and that no one manager stacks his or her team with all the best players.

In fantasy basketball leagues, winners are decided using two points systems: Head-to-Head, and Rotisserie. In the Head-to-Head league, each team enters the points that its players have scored against a rival team during that week. These points include rebounds, assists, blocks, steals and points scored. The team that earns the most points, based on the way its players have performed on the court, wins that week. In the Rotisserie League, player statistics are tallied up against the entire league.

Before each game begins, you are required to prepare your team line-ups. This is where your skill and knowledge of the game comes into play. You may have superstars on your team, but if you play them in the wrong position, you may not get realize the greatest benefits.

The success of your team depends on how well (or how poorly) the players you have chosen are performing. You have the right to trade away players who are not performing well, or to draft a rookie who has taken the tournament by storm. The trade off is done in a very just manner, overseen by your league commissioner.

The team that tops the league with the most points at the end of the season walks away with the jackpot.

Millions have joined the fun of fantasy basketball leagues. They are fun ways to test your skills as a coach and manager, and prepare you for the day that you just might land that NBA dream job.