The Sun Baseball League is made up of 12 owners who have two things in common: They 1) once worked in the San Bernardino Sun sports department and they 2) love baseball.

The first season was played in 1983 and the draft for the 34th season was held over five hours on Wednesday night (or, in the case of one person living in France, early Thursday morning).

First, let’s share the news on the players who went in the first two rounds of the draft. A few surprises in there.

1. Mike Trout; 2. Paul Goldschmidt; 3. Bryce Harper; 4. Giancarlo Stanton; 5. Carlos Correa; 6. Josh Donaldson; 7. Andrew McCutchen; 8. Clayton Kershaw; 9. Manny Machado; 10. Nolan Arenado; 11. Kris Bryant; 12. Miguel Cabrera; 13. Jose Altuve.

14. Anthony Rizzo; 15. Jose Bautista; 16. Jose Abreu; 17. Jake Arrieta; 18. Joey Votto; 19. A.J. Pollock; 20. Max Scherzer; 21. Mookie Betts; 22. Buster Posey; 23; Edwin Encarnacion; 24. Chris Sale; 25. Matt Carpenter; 26. Chris Davis.

One surprise? That Goldschmidt went ahead of Harper in the opening minutes of the draft. Most owners would have taken Harper before Goldschmidt and they may have had him ahead of Trout, too — the sense being that Trout seems to have plateaued and that he will be hampered by playing for a weak Los Angeles Angels team.

Another surprise: Four of the first 11 picks were third basemen.

There was a time in baseball, a century ago, when third base was very much considered a position for a defensive specialist.

But the SBL does not take defense into account. It does, however, look for guys with big statistics on offense, and that certainly includes the Donaldson-Machado-Aredondo-Bryant hot-corner quartet.

Pitchers were not heavily represented in the first two rounds, with only three of the first 26 players throwing the ball for a living. The SBL has 11 statistics and five of them are pitching, and one of those is for saves, which starting pitchers are not going to get.

The history of fantasy baseball — with the emphasis being trying to predict what would happen in the coming season, and not replaying a season already finished — is not a long one.

It appears a league in Chicago was formed in the late 1970s, perhaps the first, and is still in existence.

The group that really propelled the notion — which bores to death about 95 percent of all Americans — was based in New York and became known as the Rotisserie League, and they published their rules in the early 1980s. Many leagues follow their rule book.

The SBL came along in 1983, promulgated by a staffer named Vic West (who is still in the business) and has a method of play I believe is specific to our league.

Some leagues accrue statistics over the course of a season, and a look at who has the most at the end leads to a winner. Other forms of fantasy ball involve daily games.

The SBL calls for eight position players and a DH, with backups at every position, if the “starter” is on a team not playing that day, and nine pitchers (five starters, four relievers).

The SBL follows 11 statistics — runs scored by each team’s individual players, RBI, doubles-triples, home runs, steals and on-base percentage … and, on the pitching side, ERA, won-loss records, strikeouts per inning, hits-walks allowed per inning and saves.

Some of those statistics are not considered particularly important in these times of sophisticated statistical analysis, but that’s what we have. The only changes have been trimming a few stats (from 15 to 11) in the early days and, a decade or so ago, replacing batting average with OBP.

Also, the SBL adds up stats at the end of each week, and then plays “games”, six or seven for 26 weeks. We have a schedule; teams play division rivals 18 times a season and the other division 12 times each, matching the 11 stats against other teams, which yields a 162-game season — just like they have in MLB!

We also draft 12 teams of 25 players before every season. No holdovers. So everyone gets a shot at Albert Pujols or Rickey Henderson and Cal Ripken.

If you are still with me … you are a rare bird. But I can guarantee that these 12 owners, who in many cases see each other only on draft night, over the next six months will be poring over boxscores, looking for what “their” guys did and waiting for the weekly results and standings provided by commissioner Mike Davis.

Our defending champion is Andrew Baggarly, the author and long-time San Francisco Giants beat reporter. He is the 11th person to win the SBL title, and far more than 11 owners have been in the league, since 1983.

Another point of pride is this: The SBL does not play for money.

Some people find that ridiculous. For them, fantasy means money, too. Some co-workers refused to play in a league without money in the balance.

We think the purely amateur set-up adds integrity to the proceedings.

We play for the love of the game, and the notion that for this one game, this one week, this one season, we assembled together a better team than did our fellow owners. That is reward enough.