As an avid gamer I have been intrigued with professional esports for better part of 4 years and it would always grind my gears when people said it didn’t take any skill or effort like a sport. However in reality it takes just as much skill or effort, if not more to compete in esports. As esports becomes more predominant in our culture and around the world I believe it deserves the recognition and respect that any other sport would receive. Did you know that some colleges have made esports teams and given out scholarships to students for them? In 2014, Robert Morris University in Chicago became the first U.S. college to make video gaming a varsity sport, even offering scholarship prizes(choices.scholastic.com). I will be explaining how the definition of a sport applies directly to esports, how it includes strategy, technique and opponents, all of the elements of a sport, and then how the rapidly booming industry is pulling millions of viewers and money each year. They even feature games with ESPN-style analysis with commentators and giant touchscreen game-review boards. To start off I will be going into the background and history of esports. Competitive gaming, or esports has existed almost as long as video games themselves. Even the earliest arcade games led to some fierce competition. Early on, a lot of that competition took the form of friends challenging each other to best their high scores, but it didn’t take long for organized tournaments to begin popping up. The first video game tournament was held by Atari in 1980 for the game space invaders, even though it was just the first one it attracted 10,000 participants. This tournament sowed the seeds the seeds that would become the esports we know today (Tyler F.M Edwards). Af... ... middle of paper ... ... spend a huge amount of time working on strategy. Esports players may sit in front of a computer screen for 14 hours a day and you may think they are unhealthy, well on the contrary most of them work out too stay healthy because a healthy body leads to a healthy mind which is the most important tool in esports. Esports athletes have incredible reaction times and esports players can make more than 300 actions per minute, which takes multitasking to a whole new level. Their technique must be impeccable otherwise they will get crushed the strategy based game known as LOL. All the game is strategy and macro play. Every esports event held for LOL has around 10 team competing twice a week. That is 20 games a week versus another team. They sure as hell do have opponents. They have everything that falls under the category of every other sport. So why isn’t it recognized?
Growing up in America sport is a vital part of everyday life. From childhood to adulthood some aspect of sport pertains to virtually everyone. As a child one is looking to find a hobby so they play sports. As a parent fathers look forward to coaching their child’s little league team. And as tens and young adults sports are an opportunity to become a “somebody” and do something amazing. The general perception in high school and college is that athletes have it all. If you’re good at sports then you don’t have to worry about schoolwork or popularity and essentially you have but not a care in the world; you are invincible. Although it is great to see some succeed and become professional athletes many others do not have the same fate. The fate of these athletes, which happens to be the majority, is what drives my opinion on college sport.
Since the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s (NCAA) inception in 1906 there have been laws in place to protect the amateurism status of its student athletes. Over the last 100 years the NCAA has morphed into a multimillion dollar business. The success and revenue that student athletes have brought the NCAA and its member institutions has sparked a debate of whether or not to compensate players for paying. Research in the field has focused on the debate and reasons to pay players and reasons not to. There has been little attempt to assert the thoughts, feelings, and opinions of the student athletes. The purpose of this study is to examine what the thoughts, feelings, and attitudes of the student athletes towards NCAA amateurism laws. Informal face to face interviews with Division 1 student athletes at universities in Indiana will be conducted to get an analysis of the attitudes, opinions, and feelings Division 1 student athletes have towards NCAA Amateurism laws.
Throughout the country young men and women are losing their priority for an education. To attend a university should be a highly cherished privilege, and it should be an even greater honor to play athletics for the university. Therefore, the writer supports the decision that the “student” comes before “athlete” in student-athlete. Playing for pay should be considered a job for “professionals”. In the rulebook, the NCAA views college athletes as armatures. This statement sums it up best. When athletes go to college, not all of them go in with the mindset that athletics is going to be their future job....
Millions of Americans stare at ESPN or absorb themselves in the most recent issue of Sports Illustrated just to catch the latest news on their favorite teams' recruits, recent games, and statistics. Often just viewed as a past time to most, it is easy to lose sight of why these athletes are on the field, court, etc. to begin with. Believe it or not, it's for their education. These young adults ranging anywhere from seventeen to twenty-three years of age are all members of the NCAA (National Collegiate Athletic Association). As such these students must initially meet the requirements to get accepted into their chosen university, participate in their sport, and ultimately graduate from their selected institution.
Learning to set goals and achieve them as a student-athlete will help them become a well-rounded individual. Student-athletes should not be paid to play and the amateur status should remain as it has for generations. Student-athletes have not matured enough at this stage of life to be able to handle all of the additional responsibilities that would be forced upon them with the professional status. Put the almighty dollar aside and let student-athletes be student’s first, amateur athletes second, allowing them to grow and mature into tomorrow’s effective leaders.
Dave, Paresh. “Online game League of Legends star gets U.S. visa as pro athlete”. latimes.com. 7 August 2013. Web. 18 Feb 2014. google.com
The payment of NCAA student-athletes will deteriorate the value of an education to the athletes. The value of an education for a young man or woman cannot be measured. It is our gate way to success as...
The huge amount of money being made off college sports has led some to question whether student-athletes can be considered amateurs any longer, and whether they should, instead, be paid for their efforts, the argument can be made that the opportunity to both receive an education and get the exposure to win a major professional contract more than compensates NCAA athletes for their
I believe that college sports should be considered a profession. Athletes deserve to be paid for their work. College athletics are a critical part of America’s culture and economy. At the present time, student-athletes are considered amateurs. College is a stepping-stone to the professional leagues. The NCAA is exploiting the student- athlete. Big-time schools are running a national entertainment business that controls the compensation rate of the players like a monopoly (Byers 1).
The games were introduced to the Trobiand as a form of entertainment to replace their former tradition of obligatory warfare, or kayasa. The Trobians made many changes on all levels of the game. The game was no longer just a game, but competition become more heavily a rivalry between teams and the games became political. Someone might organize and pay for a game to occur to further a cause for themselves. They enlarged the team size, teams could have as many as 50+ people.
Sports were created for the enjoyment of beings and friendly competition. Today society has shifted the friendly competition to more of a money based system rather than fun and games. The typical athletes’ road to success is starting from a young age, playing in high school, and then receiving a scholarship for College and all athletes overall objective is to constantly get better and play professionally. Universities have really manipulated athletes in the world today giving them “free education” for the exchange of their blood, sweet, and tears, while they receive revenue that athletes bring in yearly. It is very evident that College athletes deserve to be paid, and universities need to find a way to pay them a reasonably amount because of all the revenue they bring into each of their universities.
For decades there has been a debate on student athletes and their drive to succeed in the classroom. From the very beginning of organized college level athletics, the goal to want to succeed in athletics has forced students to put academics to the back burner. In spite of the goal to want to succeed over a hundred years of attempts to check limits of intercollegiate athletic programs on colleges' academic standards still seems to struggle to this day. This brings to surface one of the most asked questions in sports, “What effect does college sports have on academics and economics?” Herbert D. Simons, Derek Van Rheenen, and Martin V. Covington, authors of “Academic Motivation and the Student Athlete” researched the topic on whether athletics and academics benefit each other. Bryan Flynn, the author of “College Sports vs. Academics” poses the question “Should institutions of higher learning continue to involve themselves in athletic programs that often turn out to be virtual arms races for recruiting talented players who bring big money and prestige, but put academics to the back burner?” Although both authors agree that sports have an impact on an athlete’s academics, the focus of their argument differs.
On the side that is for eSports to be considered among the tier of sports that is broadcast on televisions throughout the world. Nick Allen, Riot Games manager ...
Just like the National Football League (NFL) or National Basketball Association (NBA), there is a league for video games as well, called Major League of Gaming (MLG). Competitors play in tournaments all around the world to receive either prize money or the chance to be sponsored by several companies. One very famous player in the First Player Shooter games (FPS) Optic Nadeshot, who is sponsored by Redbull, was interviewed regarding his sponsor. He said that he plays video games for about eight to ten hours every single day. He also makes videos on YouTube and has live streams that people watch of him gaming. In some of his videos, there are even ads, which is another source of re...
Sports, a very popular past time today, have been around since ancient times. Greek Olympic Games featured events from chariot races, javelin throws, to wrestling. In addition, a game similar to soccer was played in China by the second century BC. In England, a violent rugby type game was even played to settle feuds between villages. With the development of the industrial revolution and the creation of the first public schools, sports decreased in violence and were played more recreationally and constructively. Basketball was invented to help the youth in New England spend their energy in the winter months. Since the early 1900’s sports have been a key experience in the United States (“History of Sports”). I have played sports for many years, and the experience has helped me grow significantly as an individual.