Sports require your full attention, whether you’re playing little league or on a

professional sports team, there is always an amount of focus needed. Players must be able to

make quick decisions in order to make a goal, touchdown or homerun. With this new era it

introduces us to innovative technology, and the concept of Esports. Esports are fast paced,

challenging and require great hand-eye coordination. Players spend hours training to be able to

compete at a professional level, similar with traditional sports. Now the controversy is between

whether an eSport can be considered a sport. It’s apparent that eSports do not possess the

physical attributes that traditional sports have, although similarities are present. Sponsorships

and contracts contribute largely to both groups, and ranking plays a crucial role in the

development of players.

We probably all have a favorite sport, but technically what is a sport? A sport is a

physical recreational activity, done simultaneously against an opponent, that includes animated

movement and positional movement that involves physical exertion (Za, 2013). Video games

changed what the perception of sports are, a new era emerged; Esports. The Webster Dictionary

defines it as, “A multiplayer video game played competitively for spectators, typically by

professional gamers.” (Merriam Webster). Sports and eSports have major similarities, yet we tend

to say eSports are not considered a sport due to the lack of physical exertion. Although, we still

classify golf, bowling, and curling in the sports bracket.

In the gaming realm first person shooter (FPS), fighting and arcade games dominated the

cyber world in the 90’s (Yurtoğlu, 2018.) By the end of the decade a push for Real-time Strategy

or RTS games were in high demand. Now not only were fast reflexes needed but critical thinking

and long-term planning skills. By the early 200’s RTS took over the eSport world (Yurtoğlu,

2018).
 A study done by the International Council for Health completed a study with 515 college

students to explore the factors of eSports and traditional sports, they explored game participation,

game attendance, sports viewership, peer pressure, marketing, performance and focus (Lee,

2011). This study concluded that between traditional sports and eSports, eSports will have a

better chance for marketing, increase focus, opportunity for competition and to fulfill strategic

goals.

Although not processing any physical exertion as a tradition sport would with physical

training, weight requirements and heavy lifting both groups require several of the same mental

skills. In each area great hand eye coordination is key, whether a player is throwing a basketball

from midcourt or stealing the opposing team’s baron in League of Legends. Players must work

long hours and be dedicated, but also know how to work as a team. Being a team player and

knowing your common goal is more about mental connection that it is with physical action. You

must be able to make quick decision right on the spot eSports and sports alike are fast paced,

challenging and over all high risk with a lot on the line for professional players. Competitive

gaming is a recognized official event at the X Games, some viewers still viewers are against it in

an athletic event. In 2014 ESPN aired an Esport event and received many angry comments on

social media platforms. However, the criticism they have become increasingly involved in Esport

coverage. (Viewership and Revenue Booming, 2019). In spite of heavy criticism, eSports and

Traditional sports have a high revenue.

Tyler “Ninja” Blevins a 26-year-old professional eSport player has been on the cover of

ESPN with his impressive kill ratio and stats on the RTS game Fortnite, receiving 72,000

viewers during competition and nets about $300,000 a month in revenue streaming (With

Viewership and Revenue Booming, 2019). eSports have gone global establishing partnerships
with ESPN, Coca-Cola, American Express, Activision Blizzard. Contracts also play a big role in

both traditional sports and eSports, players received contracts for the season or years.

An NFL player will earn about $118,000 if they make it to the Super Bowl, whether the

player steps on the field or not and of course win the infamous Lombardi Trophy (How much do

players get paid for winning the Super Bowl?) in addition players will receive $54,000 for

winning their respective conference championships plus what ever was earned during the

postseason leading up the championship. While players on the losing team will still earn a

whopping $59,000 (How much do players get paid for winning the Super Bowl?) Sports like

football, soccer, basketball get a huge following and major companies invest into teams.

Companies such as Nike, Adidas, Google, Verizon, Microsoft, Pepsi, even Dominos Pizza invest

into sports team because of the possibility for high profit. (Enomoto, 2018). On the other hand

many Americans contemplate themselves sport fans.

In 2011 63% of the American population consider themselves to be sports fans, meaning

they watched the games, purchased merchandised, paid for tickets, even threw parties to watch

their favorite team play.(marketingcharts.com/industries/sports-industries-80768, 2017). By 2020

it is predicted that 250 million people will watch a single Esport final which is higher than the

viewership for professional baseball, soccer, and hockey finals. Consumers will watch 3 billion

hours of esports which will account for 10 percent of all sport viewings. (With Viewership and

Revenue Booming, 2019).

Like in traditional sports players can also leave their team when their contract has ended

and sign over to another team. For example, Lebron James, who left the Cavaliers after being on

the team for 7 years. He got drafted in 2003 had a contract for 7 years and became a free agent.

Then joined Miami Heat team for four years before returning to the Cleveland
Cavaliers.(LeBron James. 2019). While in the eSport world legendary player Bang that played

for SKT T1 (South Korea Telecom, Team 1) for four years before switching to 100 Thieves, a

new upcoming team in North America. They are similarities between contracts on traditional

sports and eSports. Contracts work the same in both scenarios’ players can either play for a

season or years with the team.

On these teams, players received an enormous amount of following, whether if it’s on the

regular season or the Grand finals. Here in North America millions watch and attend the World

Series, The Dodgers vs The Red Sox in 2018 you would see the stadium filled with die hard fans

and people wearing their jerseys, holding up posters, cheering on their team. The Overwatch

tournament which was held in Anaheim, California convention Center at Blizzcon sold out the

venue which had the capacity of 7,500 people (https://worldcup.playoverwatch.com/en-us/)

Viewership also plays a major role to the sports and eSports universe, it’s an attention grabber.

The Nielson company says the record for the super bowl viewing was 114.4 million for the

Seattle-New England game in 2015. (Cbs/ap, 2019). In, 2015, the finals for the world

championship in League of Legends had 36 million unique viewers for the live stream, as well as

a sold-out arena in Berlin. Twitch, the live video streaming site currently sees 100 million

viewers a month covering major events. (ESports vs Traditional Sports, 2016) Different from

twitch stream viewership’s, professional players must respect and follow the rules set by the

principles.

When it comes to playing any kind of sports, there are rules and regulations that must be

followed if not there are many consequences to their actions, whether being banned for certain

amount of games or completely removed from the team. In rare occasions there are some players

that have slipped through the cracks and have gotten away with it. In 1986 during the World
Cup quarter final England Vs Argentina became one of the most memorable games in history all

because of one man named Diego Maradona, he was considered the best player in soccer during

that time and was well known for his athleticism and skill with the ball. During the game

Maradona scored the most controversial goal they called it “The hand of God” since he scored

with his hand and the officials never called it as being a handball. (Platt, 2018). eSports, violating

the rules and regulations is also a big situation, you might think that, just by being a video game

cheating isn’t going to be a big deal. In this situation the game League of Legends in October of

2012 was in its playoff rounds for the World championship one of the team members Woong,

from Azubu Frost kept looking at the big screen that broadcasted it the audience, during some

pauses of the game, he gained information of where the enemy where located on map therefore,

Woong was caught cheating, his consequences where told to him after the game ended. He was

fined $30,000. (Plunkett, 2013)

Now we consider on both sides, eSports might just seem like a joke to some however, it’s

up to par with the traditional sports that we all know. Traditional sports teams have sponsorships,

contracts, stadiums, huge fanbase, popular players like Lebron James, Tiger Woods, Leo Messi,

Rodger Federer, Tom Brady, the list goes on. eSports have all the similarities that traditional

sports carry, the most popular professional players make the most money. The highest paid

eSport player makes a whopping 4.1 million. In total I gave you both sides of Traditional sports

and eSport, listed articles, the revenues from equal sides the fan base, how physical and non-

physical players team up and practice. Traditional sports will always be the father of sports we

are entering a new era of sports where competitive online professional gamers, build a team

strive to become the best and at the end represent a whole country during the world
Championships, and broadcasting for millions to see back home, that’s what eSports and sports

are about.
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