Joshua Rollinson

Jackie Burr, Instructor

English 2010

21 April 2020

Esports Are Sports, A Evaluation

Esports. A new kind of entertainment. Competitive video games, and the world’s new

dreams. Professional players practice countless hours in hopes of being sponsored, or winning

tournaments they enter. But are they sports? This essay will be an evaluation and put down

criteria of which esports meets to “qualify” as sports. There will be talk of similarities and

differences also the talk of the physical aspects of esports, and more.

To start, most people would define esports as just competitive video games, and nothing

else to it. This is a poor mindset as it neglects the opportunities that esports brings to the table.

Especially when its community is growing exponentially and even competes at top levels of

viewership with other sports, for example, the super bowl. Last year in 2019, the LCS, the major

video game league for League of Legends, received about 100-150 million viewers, whereas the

superbowl only peaked at 99 million viewers. Evidence shows that this is clear that esports are

massive, and need the respect and credit they deserve.

In an interview with Spencer Garner also known as, Bestness, is a Super Smash Bros.

Ultimate professional player. On top of being ranked #1 in Utah and currently ranked #43 in the

world he is also sponsored by Armada Esports. He has good placings and has been in the scene

for 5+ years. A confident way to say Spencer knows his way around the scene. He was asked

about the esports community and how he feels about esports as a whole. To summarize, he
basically mentions that the community is growing and is growing fast, and people are quick to

judge esports, and that is something that needs to change. “The next generation is going to take

advantage of what Esports has to offer and careers in Esports will be more common than ever.”

To say, Spencer definitely believes that esports need the recognition and the respect in order to

continue growing healthily. So how is that done? First it's needed that the world recognizes

esports as a sport. In doing so, people for one, don't downplay the concept of esports as a whole,

and two it will encourage more players, and more skillful talent to come out of the shadows, as it

becomes a more viable career. Finally third, it allows many new job opportunities outside of the

actual competitors to rise, brands, coaches, stream teams, etc. A survey taken on thetylt.com did

a poll on their twitter and facebook on why or why not esports competitors be considered

athletes? The end result ended really close with 52.5% voting that they are not athletes, and

47.5% voting they are. Now this concludes that there is already for one a huge community that

believes so, and that this argument isn’t just some small issue. Now to say that there are still

more people that believe that it’s not an issue, and we’re here to change that.

Next, the word athlete can mean a lot of things, A competitor, sports player, and even a

video game player. All three have been used under the word athlete. Most would argue that

esports would never meet the physical requirements of a real athlete. During a ted talk by

Anthony Betrus titled, “Esports is Real Sports” he talks about the direct relations to physical

activity during esports. Scientific evidence shows that eSports professionals are real athletes. “...

The amount of cortisol produced by those playing video games professionally was equivalent to

that of a race-car-driver.” esports professionals also have high pulse, sometimes reaching

160-180 beats per minute, equivalent to someone during a very fast run, or a marathon. On a
keyboard, esport athletes reach up to 400 movements on the keyboard per minute. Four times as

much as the average person. Esports as a whole is just as demanding if not more demanding than

most other sports. Now obviously, there are exceptions to the rule, and also how you would

define how physically taxing it really is, but at a top level, esports professionals have to have

very good endurance and proper practice in order to keep up with the other top players. Now as it

hits criteria, it becomes more obvious that esports can fit in the definition of sports. Although,

that isn’t all.

To explain, There are other aspects of sports such as the community, teams, sponsors, and

more. In Uriah Tagle’s scholarly article titled, “As North American Esports Level Up, Its Players

Lag Behind.” Has plenty of information on just the statistics of jobs inside of esports, and all the

regulations to uphold. For one, many esports have age regulations where you have to be a certain

age to join. OWL and NBA2KL two gaming leagues both require you must be 18, or a legal

adult to be on a professional team. LCS requires you to be at least 17, and other leagues go as

low as 14. Now these are completely legitimate jobs with sponsors and teams. They must “go to

work” and practice all day. The Shanghai Dragons, an OWL team, practice for 13 hours a day

together in order to meet the jobs standards. The salary for these kinds of jobs aren’t as big as

regular sports, but are salaries to not scoff at. LCS players have the highest minimum salary of

75k a year, with OWL players guaranteed at least 50k a year, and NBA2KL a base of 32k.

Besides NBA2KL, the other 2 leagues pay salaries that are higher than those of the average

salary in most states. The reason these leagues can do so well is because of broadcasting.

Broadcasting brings in millions of viewers and plenty of revenue to pay for the leagues, and its

players, specifically those who win. These are all things similar to sports. The fact that esports
basically have the same process as regular sports, is also a reason to be mind boggled at the fact

that they aren’t recognized yet. In Michael Arin’s scholarly article, “Competing Competitions:

Anticompetitive Conduct by Publisher-Controlled Esports Leagues.” His whole article talks

about an additional side to esports, something regular sports don’t even have. The fact that there

are plenty of leagues, there are also certain esports that get by without sponsorships from their

official games. LCS, OWL are examples of huge leagues where they get help from the original

game developers and are officially sponsored by them. Games like Super Smash Bros. Melee, a

2001 hit, doesn't get official sponsorships from Nintendo. So these tournament organizers of the

years, have built up their own leagues, usually their own tournaments, and have major showings

from hundreds of players, and the best of the best show up, and broadcast it, and make enough to

keep the tournaments coming each year. Something regular sports don’t have. They rely on

major leagues to uphold and present new opportunities to allow more players in. Anyone could

become an esports player. Not everyone can become a major sports player. On viewsonic.com

they have an article titled, “Is Esports a Sport?” and have divided esports into categories that can

easily be shown they hit criteria specifically, Skillful, Strategy, Teamwork, Competitive,

Professional, Success, Celebrity, and Business. All of which can be found under sports regularly

as they go hand in hand. The rest of the article goes through the definition of sports and the

different definitions found on different dictionaries, and then follows through to find all the

evidence for the criteria met. Another article by Jack Stewart titled, “Why esports ARE real

sports:” goes through just similar arguments, but has a stumble specifically around the area of

athleticism. Which in very simple terms, can be an issue, it is true that esports professionals have

to spend very little time exercising to get to the point they are at. It's all mental, even if their
hearts get up to similar bpm as other athletes, it still doesn’t have the same taxing toll on the

body. It will always be less. Now while that's true, it's not a big enough reason to disregard

esports as a sport. They still have to perform at a top level all the time which does take its toll on

the body, even if it isn’t the exact same as playing a regular sport.

Finally, another interview, more specifically on the lifestyle of an esports professional.

Keith Markovic, a professional CS:GO player on the professional team, Team Liquid, talks about

his experience on the team during his career. Keith talks about the experience they have on the

big stage and all the pressure put onto them, this interview specifically takes place during a new

york tournament where Keith was playing for 250 thousand dollars, a huge sum of money. Keith

also mentions that unlike other teams they do all live in seperate apartments, and not in a team

house together, but work together in a huge industry team liquid building together. There is also

mention of the amount of merchandise that is purchased by the fans, and also after the

tournament they had a fan signing afterwards. The esports life is something Keith says he wants

to live the rest of his life with. He believes that he is an athlete and will continue providing for

team liquid as a professional esports player. Also within the interview there is a player with the

name of, Emily Oeser, an Overwatch team captain of her University team, believes she’s an

athlete and should be recognized for her talent, she goes through all the struggles of being a

woman within these predominantly male scene, but makes a name for herself and her team. The

point under this interview was to point out how universities are putting hundreds of thousands of

dollars into the industry within their own universities. These colleges recognize the value under

which they could have players play under them, and also the value in esports. With all of the

evidence shown, it's obvious that esports fits the criteria under sports as a whole, whether that's
under physical activity or under the competitive side, how big esports is, the communities behind

it, the game scenes that help run it all, and finally the salaries within the industry are all valid. It

all fits together in one ecosystem. Esports is a real sport, and real professional athletes play

inside these wonderful teams for the crown of being number 1.

 Works Cited

Arin, Michael. “Competing Competitions: Anticompetitive Conduct by Publisher-Controlled Esports

Leagues.” ​Minnesota Law Review,​ vol. 104, no. 3, Feb. 2020, pp. 1585–1646. ​EBSCOhost​,

search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=142016255&site=ehost-live.

Betrus, Anthony. “Esports is Real Sports” Ted: Ideas Worth Spreading, August 2019

Davis, Chris. “Is Esports a Sport?” ​ViewSonic Library,​ 18 December 2019,

www.viewsonic.com/library/entertainment/is-esports-sport/.

Garner, Spencer. Discord Interview. 7 April 2020.

Mailonline, Jack Stewart For. “Why Esports ARE Real Sports.” ​Daily Mail Online, Associated Newspapers,​ 24

August 2017, www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/esports/article-4812762/Why-esports-real-sports.html.

Markovic Keith, “From playing at home to the arena, inside a billion0dollar eSports industry” ​ABC News​. 22

March 2019 ​https://youtu.be/IrnZ7SboHvI

Tagle, Uriah. “As North American Esports Levels Up, Its Players Lag Behind.” ​Texas Review of

Entertainment & Sports Law​, vol. 19, no. 2, Spring 2019, pp. 81–87. ​EBSCOhost​,

search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=136705147&site=ehost-live.

Tran Daniel, “Should eSports Competitors Be Considered Athletes” ​Tylt.​ https://thetylt.com/sports/esports-athletes

Young, Henry. “ESports: Is pro Video Gaming a Sport?”​ CNN, Cable News Network,​ 31 May 2016,

www.cnn.com/2016/05/31/sport/esports-is-professional-gaming-a-sport/index.html.