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Thumbs Off Controllers and Up for Esports: Should Esports be Considered a Real Sport?

Esports is the new and revolutionary way to compete against others. This SPORT

changes the way the games are played. It forces people to use their brain more than their

physique. This is why people should be more informed about esports and should recognize it as a

sport. Other than being played locally. Esports can also be played internationally with teams all

over the globe. Esports biggest controversy is debating whether it’s considered an official sport

or not based on the definition of sports. By Oxford dictionary, the definition of sport is “An

activity involving physical exertion and skill in which an individual or team competes against

another or others for entertainment” (Oxford 1). Esports should be considered a real sport

because it requires equal or more skill than other traditional sports, it would open a

doorway for many businesses, also esports includes its own strict guidelines similar to other

sports.

Based on this definition by Oxford dictionary, many claim to say that esports isn’t a

official sport as it requires “physical exertion”. Although holes may be poked through this

ideology of esports not needing physical exertion, many say it can require equal or more skills

than other sports need. Take soccer for a example, a player would need to know simple control

of the ball along with other basics as passing the ball to another player without the ball

interfering with another player , or kicking the ball with precise aim to score a goal without the

goalkeeper stopping the shot. As far as esports goes, a player would need to know how to make

quick and reasonable decisions, have extremely fast reflexes, have very accurate aim and an

enormous amount of in-game sense mix with very strategic tactics to outplay their opponents.
Comparing the two can show what one another lacks but the only major difference in esports is

the needed physical movement.

Besides the needed “physical exertion” under Oxford diction of the word sport, all else

applies for esports, even things that general sports include such as guidelines. Many sports have

strict guideline and rules that is followed by the players to keep a fair and safe environment.

Esports follows under this with having strict guidelines, rules and code of conducts with each

player. Some of the listed guidelines would be offenses as “Serious public criticism of, or

inappropriate comment in relation to, an incident occurring in a Match or Event or any Player,

Player Support Personnel, Official or Team participating in a Match, irrespective of when such

criticism or inappropriate comment is made”(ESIC 1), written in such formal matter covering

many type of offenses along with rules. In the guidelines, they are heavily strict on cheating

matters with penalties leading up to suspension of esports and related events between 12 months

or a lifetime, and depending on the level of offense, a fine of all of the match or event’s prize

pool. Esports also goes in depth with many other rules and violations in their guidelines and code

of conducts, just alike many other sports.

Violationing the guidelines or code of conduct can lead to harsh penalties or fines in

esports. For example, Dallas fuel player, Félix “xQc” Lengyel was recently fined $2,000 and

suspended for four matches in the Overwatch League on January 19, 2018 on violating the code

of conduct for the Overwatch League. Félix violated the code of conducts during his individual

livestream when making homophobic remarks towards a another Overwatch League player,

Austin “Muma” Wilmot, who is openly gay after Dallas fuel followed a loss to the team Austin

plays for, (Good 1). To put this in perspective, this shows how serious esports is with its

guidelines, to even suspend a player while not undergoing an official match or in related events.
Actions like this occurs in other sports as well, for example, NFL team, New England Patriots,

were caught cheating by the team videotaping the coaches’ signals from the New York Jets

during a game back in September 9, 2007. Patriots head coach Bill Belichick was fined $500,000

by the NFL, along with the team being fined with $250,000 and losing their first round pick in

the 2008 NFL Draft (Beckett 1).

Athletes train practically everyday to keep their bodies in shape and to keep improving

the basics of the sport they play professionally to further advance their skill. Training can be

typically be from 5-6 hours for professional players on varies different sports, although each

training varies as well for each sport. In esports, some players train harsh hours everyday to

perform better and may even differ for each player and each game. Former StarCraft II

champion, Greg “IdrA” Fields says, "When I played in Korea [from 2008 to 2011], the training

schedule excluded any activity that wasn't eating, sleeping and practicing." Basically, Fields said,

in 2013 "we played for 12 hours a day with one or two days off a month” (Stanton 1). As

extreme as this training may seem, it is very likely other pro players can follow a harsh schedule

like this. Even when not training for such long hours, at average teams would probably train for

at least six hours a day, six days a week.

Training varies for each sport and what position you’re placed in. A quarterback in

American football prime focus would be towards their arm strength and footwork, while in

soccer, a goalkeeper’s prime focus would be leg and arm strength along with diving practices. In

esports, players would be training on their reflexes, aim and callouts. Knowing what each role

practices, helps one understand that it is also important to know how each is practiced. A

quarterback would practice by lifting weights to help improve how far he may throw the ball, as

for footwork, a quarterback may practice by memorizing weak routes towards him or
memorizing plays to predict which way a sack may come from. For a goalkeeper, squats,

crunches and most calf building workouts are highly recommended and used, as for diving

practice, it’ll be predicting when the ball may be kicked and understanding what parts of the net

are least guarded.

For a player in esports, since there is a variety of games, each set with different roles, or

similar roles that may need a different ways of approaching it, they practice by playing these

matches called scrims. Scrims are when two teams with similar skill level are set to face off

against each other under competitive set rules for practice (Internetslang 1). Scriming helps

improve not only individual skill sets such as aim and reflexes, it as helps these pro players

communication and callouts along with what other players weaknesses may be or even a players

strength. Typically, teams would continuously scrim with other teams for approximately six

hours to enhance their skills. Although scrims are a common way to train in esports, there is

other basic methods to help with training. This can including training along with your teammates

to practice and comprehend complex strategies and tactics, or to rather just practice individual

skill sets among one another.

Esports potential revenue would likely start to spark connections with major companies

and corporations as it is continuously growing. Esports revenue in 2015 was around $325 million

dollars and then later on proceeded to generate $493 million and last year for $696 million

dollars (Warman 1). Each year esports is increasing with revenue of up to 41.3% on a year to

year growth and is expected to grow even more. Along with esports revenue exponentially

growing, big corporations are also getting themselves involved in this potential billion dollar

business. For example, well-known business Amazon, purchased a popular live streaming

platform called “Twitch” for nearly $1 billion dollars (Borg 1). Revenues in other sports such as
the NFL goes up to $14 billion dollars in 2017 (Florio 1), but esports revenue is projected to hit

$1 billion in 2019, and is only expected to continue growing till its revenue is similar in numbers

with other traditional sports.

Along with esports revenues, comes their viewership. In 2016, the championships of role-

playing game League of Legends gained 43 million unique viewers (Syracuse 1). This was the

most number of views ever in esports history, they even surpass the amount of views for the

2014, World Series which gained 15.8 million viewers, and the NBA Finals, Heat against Spurs

with 15.5 million viewers (Schwartz 1). In fact, esports is projected to hit around a 600 million

global audience by 2020. Getting into the demographics of esports, in the United Kingdom there

is approximately an esports audience of 6.1 million, with 3.1 million of those fans being called

what is know as a “esports enthusiasts” (BBC 1). Over the years, esports continues to grow in

number of viewership and global audience.

With the audience growing and rising revenue, esports potential opportunities start to

expand. In fact, esports potential has enormously bloomed to where it has its own section under
ESPN (Lowe 1). This accomplishment shows that esports is finally gaining recognition towards

its popularity. Esports path is still continuously opening many doors of opportunities, but one of

the greatest possible milestones would be being a category for the Olympics. This years 2018,

olympics are hosted at Pyeongchang and major corporation Intel brings esports ahead of this

years winter olympics. International Olympic Committee Managing Director for Television and

Marketing Services, Timo Lumme says, “We are proud to have our Worldwide TOP Partner

Intel bring this competition to PyeongChang in the lead-up to the Olympic Winter Games 2018.

Following on from the Olympic Summit last week, the IOC will now explore esports’

relationship with the Olympic Movement further. This is just the start of an exciting future and

we’re interested to see how this experience will play out.” (Ioc 1). This insight shows that in the

near future, possibility of esports taking part of the olympics are more than likely.

In conclusion, esports can be considered a real sport because of the strict guidelines

within this sport. Esports also shows great potential in high possible income, therefore having a

high chance of invests from major businesses. Esports not only shows high possible income, but

a high amount of skills as in quick decision making, insanely fast reflexes, great communication

among teammates and amazing eye and hand coordination. With esports having global audience

of 385 million, and plenty of esports enthusiast who follow, esports many just be on its way to

the road of the olympics. Esports matters because although it is an early start, it still has a long

bright path to go with many supporting. Society has yet to recognize how big esports is and with

some people having no idea what esport is. In the future, esports would soon be seen as just an

everyday sport, with fans viewing highlights from previous matches or games, esports having

international teams participating in the olympics and competing like any other sport.
 Work Cited

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