The esports industry is slowly but surely catching up to traditional sports in terms of viewership, money, and legitimacy.
Esports revenues grew to over $1 billion in 2021—according to Newzoo, a game market insights and analytics company—for a year-over-year growth of 14.5 percent compared to 2020.
Smaller agencies that serve video game influencers and esports athletes, like Evolved Talent, Electronic Sports and Gaming Law, and Level Up, are getting bigger. Established companies like CAA and UTA are entering this new world, leveraging the influx of young fans and riding the wave of growing popularity. Between CAA and UTA, the two agencies represent a number of massive streaming names, like Ninja, Dr Disrespect, Michael “imaqtpie” Santana, and William “Scarra” Li.
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Agents are being tapped to guide players through contracts, advocate on behalf of their career aspirations, and set them up for success beyond the keyboard and mouse. Players who once joined teams for free food and housing are now seeing multi-million-dollar contracts, health insurance, and deals with non-endemic brands.
“Good agents, agents that are legitimate and doing the job correctly have made their talent alive to various components of risk that they otherwise would not be alive to,” said Stephen Hanna, director of global strategy and partnerships for the Esports Integrity Commission (ESIC). “That’s the main thing that’s valuable because the reality is as a competitive or professional competitive player you’re not going to be able to have eyes in the back of your head all the time.” 스포츠토토사이트
Journey to legitimacy
The ethically questionable practices of the past, which led to the need for agents, weren’t specific to one esports title, organization, or CEO, but rather an endemic problem in the industry.
In 2015, when one player wanted to leave the EU LCS team Meet Your Makers, the organization’s manager threatened that he would make sure his mother would lose her home. Also in the same year, a manager for Team Coast, a relegated LCS team, pocketed prize winnings for a LAN tournament without giving any to the team.
