Less sticks and balls, more keyboards and mice
We’re past the point of debating whether esports is “here” or not. At the professional level of esports, the top tournaments sell out whole stadiums, the top players earn millions of dollars, and there are more non-endemic brands in esports than ever before. What’s less talked about is the nascent youth esports market, which has an opportunity to disrupt the $9 billion dollar U.S. youth sports market.
Last but not least, naysayers point to the lack of physical activity in esports to prove that esports aren’t sports and that esports athletes aren’t athletes. According to Michael Phelps, a 23-time Olympic gold medalist, the naysayers are wrong:
What we can expect in the near future for youth esports is the continued professionalization of collegiate esports. Riot Games and Blizzard Entertainment are the two game publishers leading the charge into collegiate esports by hosting leagues and tournaments where students can win money towards their college tuition. As the infrastructure for collegiate esports matures, we can expect to see more activity at the high school level. In the U.S. alone, that represents as much as 15 million high school students (public schools). It won’t be long until many parents recognize that youth esports can help their kids with teamwork, leadership, and even physical activity.
I wrote this piece for the Havas Sports & Entertainment 2017 Trends, which was published today. There are other great pieces from esports professionals such as Christophe Agnus, Head of Esports at Vivendi and Lester Chen, Global Head of Esports at YouTube — check it out!
Youth sports is supposed to be about providing kids with life-long compounding benefits from physical activity, teamwork, and leadership. Instead, youth sports has become very expensive, financially and emotionally. Only those from families with a strong financial footing can afford the training, equipment, and participation fees required to advance and excel through the system. According to Travis Dorsch, a professor specializing in youth sports, up to 10.5 percent of a family’s gross income could be spent on sports. That means a family earning the median household income of $55,755 could be spending $5,854 on sports.
Meanwhile, the quality of coaches is far below what is expected in high school coaching and beyond. The typical background required of these coaches is former participation in high school sports, but it should also require experience with child development and physical education. The subpar coaching adds to the emotional stress of parents trying to justify their financial investment.
Youth esports can provide what youth sports was meant to provide at a much greater scale and at a fraction of the cost. The fact that every interaction inside the game and outside (keystrokes, mouse clicks) is collected makes it possible to generate insights and analysis from each and every game. This type of self-coaching can be done for millions of people for minimal server costs. However, there is sometimes a benefit of getting a real coach. Esports coaches typically charge $15 — $50 per hour, a stark discount to private coaching in sports, which can cost hundreds of dollars per hour. A standard gaming PC plus accessories cost around $600 and can be used for education, work, and a variety of other functions besides gaming. Both computing platforms and internet access are cheaper and more accessible than ever before.
Beyond the greater scale and cost savings of youth esports, it also teaches teamwork, leadership, and strategy. Like sports, it is often teamwork, not individual play, that decides victory. Like sports, it is the in-game leader making the clutch calls in the final moments of a match or motivating a team to come back from a bad play. Like sports, different strategies are built against different opponents. And building strategies for “five-dimensional chess,” as Mark Cuban, the owner of the Dallas Mavericks, famously described esports as, requires tremendous mental horsepower.
“There’s absolutely no question to me the level of skill, training and devotion it requires to become a professional gamer.”
Phelps presented the Esports Player of the Year during The Game Awards 2016 to his “fellow athlete” Marcelo “Coldzera” David, a Brazilian Counter-Strike: Global Offensive player.
While physical activity isn’t involved in the act of competitive gaming, physical fitness has become a staple for professional esports teams. The most successful teams have physical fitness regimens for their players because it takes a tremendous amount of discipline and energy to compete and win at the highest level. This has trickled down into youth esports as well since the best players in youth esports want to mimic their pro esports player role models. One example of this is the “Get fit with Snoopeh” campaign. Stephen ‘Snoopeh’ Ellis is a former professional esports player who did a small workout based on his performance during his previous games and his viewers began to copy him, improving their physical fitness.
I wrote this piece for the Havas Sports & Entertainment 2017 Trends, which was published today. There are other great pieces from esports professionals such as Christophe Agnus, Head of Esports at Vivendi and Lester Chen, Global Head of Esports at YouTube — check it out!