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the real reason people compete in pro sports is not because they have a supernatural desire to be the best but because they have skill that can make them money
amateur competitors "want" to win just as much as anyone, they just arent good enough to make money
the reason money is significant is because it's why people play
also the implication that its some kind of pro-jock injustice that real sports players make millions is fucking absurd, sorry. the only reason they make that much is because theres more popular interest, period. its not a value judgment of athletics or different types of competition. its eyeballs and asses in seats = money = salaries. realistically NO sports or esports players "deserve" millions... its just capitalism. if you think pro sc2 players are anything but extremely blessed and lucky to play computer games for money you're misguided
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Winnings are an easy, empirical, comparable measure of a player's success. Done?
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The primary reasoning for why this started (back in bw) was because the game was already several years old and nerds were playing the game hardcore as fuck with their parents telling them to get a job and go to school.
So stats like these would help them justify playing the game for 8+ hours a day in hopes of becoming a progamer to make X dollars like Boxer did or whoever.
Also, since the game is pretty grassroots, a lot of the pull for local and large scale tournaments is the purse. People care more about events when there is more at stake. It's not like in regular sports where the teams have multiple tournaments throughout the year to pick and choose from, they typically would have 1 season and all the players/teams would play in that season. The winners get the glory and probably lucrative offers from other teams or sponsors, but they really don't win money. They are already salaried (sure they can renegotiate afterwords).
That being said, since the information is there, people tend to slap it onto the wikis or stats. And trust me, all my sports nerds friends know shit like how much a player makes each year, what teams get paid the most etc. It's not something just esports does. Especially evident in the poker scene for example, obviously.
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On October 30 2014 14:52 brickrd wrote:
the real reason people compete in pro sports is not because they have a supernatural desire to be the best but because they have skill that can make them money
different pro athletes have different motives. and its a mixture of various motives, needs, and comfort level etc etc etc.
You can argue any person making any money doing anything is at least partially "doing it for the money".
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United States3725 Posts
Wow thanks for all the feedback.
I'm more concerned about the spectator side of it. It seems like they're trying too hard to justify that, yes, StarCraft 2 is a real sport. By constantly reminding us of the prize and earnings etc. they think they're showing us that e-sports is legit but to me it has the opposite effect - it just shows how far SC2 has to go before it's really accepted by mainstream viewers.
Comparisons to other sports are only there to illustrate the type of comparisons that people who aren't already into the SC2 scene might make. Of course I don't expect anyone in SC2 to get paid $30 million. But someone who isn't into e-sports who only has soccer/basketball/hockey/football as a reference might look at $60k earnings and dismiss SC2 entirely as a sport.
Anyway, seems like there are some mixed views around here on the subject so i'm not entirely alone.
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I see prize money for players as a accolade for eSports. Comparing it to regular sports, Sydney Crosby (NHL) has won, a Stanley Cup, two Olympic Gold Medals, 2 Scoring Leader Awards, 3 Best Player (voted by Peers) Awards, 2 NHL MVP awards, and more. What does eSports have to compare achievements? Tournament wins and Earnings.
Money is used as a statistic in a league that holds various tournaments. In WCS players earn points because it's a scheduled event over the course of a year (as well as earnings for each season) but the emphasis in WCS is points to get to the Grand Finals at the end of the year.
Mostly, the money earned by these eSports players is a way to show people outside of the scene that this is a legitimate career path like a professional basketball player. It's sad, but the only way outsiders consider it a valid path is $$.
If that means talking about how much money players make will lead to more sponsors, better production, and more tournaments, I don't mind it.
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On October 30 2014 22:13 DinoMight wrote:
Wow thanks for all the feedback.
I'm more concerned about the spectator side of it. It seems like they're trying too hard to justify that, yes, StarCraft 2 is a real sport. By constantly reminding us of the prize and earnings etc. they think they're showing us that e-sports is legit but to me it has the opposite effect - it just shows how far SC2 has to go before it's really accepted by mainstream viewers.
Comparisons to other sports are only there to illustrate the type of comparisons that people who aren't already into the SC2 scene might make. Of course I don't expect anyone in SC2 to get paid $30 million. But someone who isn't into e-sports who only has soccer/basketball/hockey/football as a reference might look at $60k earnings and dismiss SC2 entirely as a sport.
Anyway, seems like there are some mixed views around here on the subject so i'm not entirely alone.
Traditional sports fans understand that different sports have different salaries.
Top players in the NFL make 17 to 13 Million while top players in NHL make 8 to 5 million and top MLS players make 6 to 3 Million. It's all relative to the sport so anyone brushing off $60k earnings is not intelligent enough to understand what that means.
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$ is relevant, and other sports (namely golf, mma, boxing) all talk about prize money for victories. nfl, nhl, etc do not talk about prize money because they talk about salary all the time. ie. scott gomez gets paid $1.5 million for his annual goal, the status of someone's contrct, etc.
also, your mildly retarded brother probably isn't a good person to base a point on
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We need to change this, because the ability to keep your brother in the room is, really, the litmus test on whether or not ESPORTS is legit.
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It doesn't bother me when they mention the grand prize a couple of times in the tournament for hype - "All the players in today's tournament are working towards getting that big $10,000 first place prize." The first place prize is usually big enough to be impressive, and hypes up the whole tournament, but doesn't specifically refer to each gamer's reason for playing.
It does bother me when they mention the money for each round - "Snute has to win this game to move on to the round of 16 and secure a prize of $1,000." Not only does this sum of money seem small and almost insignificant, it gives the feeling that the player has no other incentives and is rather desperate for pocket change. I'd rather they focus on other motives - "he's never made it this far!" or "he needs to move on to meet his rival!" or "he's the last Zerg in the tournament!" all work so much better for me.
These are things I didn't notice as much in the first couple of years of SC2, but I have noticed a lot recently. I'm not sure why, but I would like the casters to give me a bigger reason to cheer for someone. I'm not sure if this is because the whole "SC2 is dying" mentality has driven casters to the point they feel they have to shout out "See? He's making money! Even if he isn't the best in the world, he made money!" or if it just has become the thing for people to say, but I hope they stop. There are so many more interesting things in SC2's pro scene to talk about 
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EPT
