On my way home from work this evening I was listening to The Doug Gottlieb Show on ESPN Radio as I always do. Doug was asking listeners what they liked about the NFL (in the aftermath of the crackdown on head injuries and vicious hits regarding specifically 'Bountygate').
One listener emailed in saying he liked the strategy of the game - a quarterback slicing up a defense or a defense scheming to confused and disrupt the offense - is fascinating for him. Doug concurred and added that is why he also enjoys watching competitive Starcraft. He didn't specifically clarify BW or SC2, perhaps I am making an assumption posting it in the SC2 forum but I think it's a safe bet. Doug said it was like watching fast paced chess and he loved the strategy of the game. He ended with the words "hashtag TMI" lol.
I think it is really awesome that the host of a very prominent primetime show on ESPN radio watches Starcraft!
I don't know what the purpose of this post is exactly (maybe should have been a blog) but I thought it would be cool to tweet or email Doug and mention Starcraft. Perhaps ask him who his favorite player is, if he'd ever consider attending an MLG or IPL, or whatever.
P.S. If possible I will try to find an audio clip of the show or a transcript of some kind since I was paraphrasing.
Thanks sihyunie!
"Interestingly enough, one of my other favorite things to watch is the competitive play of Starcraft. Starcraft is a real time computer strategy that is a mental chess battle that is far more visually interesting and fast paced than watching a chess match."
Around 7:30 min mark on his third hour. (must be ESPN Insider subscriber to listen)
Thats pretty cool. I like Gottlieb and its pretty cool that he likes pro sc2, ok maybe its BW, but either way its cool. I'm gonna tweet at him for sure.
Hahaha, #TMI. He knows its dangerous waters mentioning a video game outside of the mainstream on ESPN radio. Awesome that he watches the game though. Might be one of the heavy pushers at ESPN Studios talking to Sundance.
I'd like to think that it is only a matter of time before eSports does become mainstream in the West, considering the widespread popularity of video games and the fact that the video game industry is simply massive in the United States. That being said, many US gamers are more casual gamers, and thus I also fear simple games like Angry Birds or Fruit Ninja become the dominant "sport" (see WCG).
"Interestingly enough, one of my other favorite things to watch is the competitive play of Starcraft. Starcraft is a real time computer strategy that is a mental chess battle that is far more visually interesting and fast paced than watching a chess match."
love gottleib's comments. actually had a decent chance at becoming a basketball coach at kansas state... so he's kinda really knowledgeable about the game. neat that he watches starcraft
looks like he also just retweeted a post about starcraft, really, really cool.
Out of everyone at ESPN to admit to watching Starcraft it had to be the one guy who is always a total dick to my hometown college because he was kicked out for stealing. I guess I will begrudging respect him now.
Nerds are nerds, just in all our different incarnations. Sports nuts fawning over box scores and lineup changes and free agency sound like... Starcraft fans doing the same (build orders, map stats, and the like). At some point there will be a union between the two - or at least an acknowledgement that most are fans of both and to be a fan of one isn't mutually exclusive.
On May 08 2012 10:37 BoZiffer wrote: Nerds are nerds, just in all our different incarnations. Sports nuts fawning over box scores and lineup changes and free agency sound like... Starcraft fans doing the same (build orders, map stats, and the like). At some point there will be a union between the two - or at least an acknowledgement that most are fans of both and to be a fan of one isn't mutually exclusive.
The issue, in my experience at least, is that its much harder for "sports nerds" if you will to accept that there isn't much of a difference between what they do and what "starcraft nerds" do. Most of the "sports nerds" I know laugh at the idea of professional starcraft being existent let alone at any level that is similar to sports in any way. It sort of goes back to jock/geek stereotypes, no jock wants to be a geek no matter how similar they happen to be.
Wow, that's cool as shit to get such a mainstream shout out. I really hate Gottlieb as a personality, but I bet at least a few thousand people googled Starcraft as a result of this.
On May 08 2012 10:37 BoZiffer wrote: Nerds are nerds, just in all our different incarnations. Sports nuts fawning over box scores and lineup changes and free agency sound like... Starcraft fans doing the same (build orders, map stats, and the like). At some point there will be a union between the two - or at least an acknowledgement that most are fans of both and to be a fan of one isn't mutually exclusive.
The issue, in my experience at least, is that its much harder for "sports nerds" if you will to accept that there isn't much of a difference between what they do and what "starcraft nerds" do. Most of the "sports nerds" I know laugh at the idea of professional starcraft being existent let alone at any level that is similar to sports in any way. It sort of goes back to jock/geek stereotypes, no jock wants to be a geek no matter how similar they happen to be.
My experience in the home domain of sports nerds, the comments sections of statistic and strategic analysis blogs, is that a lot of them are gamers already, a good number of them enjoy competitive gaming in some fashion, and all of them enjoy Keen gifs.
On May 08 2012 10:37 BoZiffer wrote: Nerds are nerds, just in all our different incarnations. Sports nuts fawning over box scores and lineup changes and free agency sound like... Starcraft fans doing the same (build orders, map stats, and the like). At some point there will be a union between the two - or at least an acknowledgement that most are fans of both and to be a fan of one isn't mutually exclusive.
The issue, in my experience at least, is that its much harder for "sports nerds" if you will to accept that there isn't much of a difference between what they do and what "starcraft nerds" do. Most of the "sports nerds" I know laugh at the idea of professional starcraft being existent let alone at any level that is similar to sports in any way. It sort of goes back to jock/geek stereotypes, no jock wants to be a geek no matter how similar they happen to be.
I would say that it is the most significant of stereotypes to be broken for widespread mainstream acceptance. I like to consider myself "trans-border" if you will. Played college basketball, married a collegiate athlete (volleyball player), and love Starcraft as much as I love my Buffalo Bills, Sabres, the NBA, PGA Tour, MMA and any other competition I can get my hands on. I am a competition junky. I would watch competitive Tiddly Winks if there were such a thing. But, the two communities have much more in common than they would ever like to admit in public.
On May 08 2012 11:10 holy_war wrote: I can't wait for the day that Skip Bayless starts to yell and argue about pro SC2 matches with Stephen A. Smith on First Take!
On May 08 2012 10:37 BoZiffer wrote: Nerds are nerds, just in all our different incarnations. Sports nuts fawning over box scores and lineup changes and free agency sound like... Starcraft fans doing the same (build orders, map stats, and the like). At some point there will be a union between the two - or at least an acknowledgement that most are fans of both and to be a fan of one isn't mutually exclusive.
The issue, in my experience at least, is that its much harder for "sports nerds" if you will to accept that there isn't much of a difference between what they do and what "starcraft nerds" do. Most of the "sports nerds" I know laugh at the idea of professional starcraft being existent let alone at any level that is similar to sports in any way. It sort of goes back to jock/geek stereotypes, no jock wants to be a geek no matter how similar they happen to be.
I would say that it is the most significant of stereotypes to be broken for widespread mainstream acceptance. I like to consider myself "trans-border" if you will. Played college basketball, married a collegiate athlete (volleyball player), and love Starcraft as much as I love my Buffalo Bills, Sabres, the NBA, PGA Tour, MMA and any other competition I can get my hands on. I am a competition junky. I would watch competitive Tiddly Winks if there were such a thing. But, the two communities have much more in common than they would ever like to admit in public.
I completely agree with you. Its just in my experience I've seen plenty more "starcraft nerds" accepting that they're basically doing the same thing as [insert sport] nerds, yet very little of the other way around. But besides one of my good friends who happens to be a basketball fan and a starcraft fan, all of my sports only friends don't enjoy the idea of being similar to a starcraft nerd in any way. Its still a long way to go before both become mainstream, and I don't think the issue is nearly as much on the esports side as it is on the sports side.
That's pretty cool to hear . I wonder if anyone will call in on the subject in the future.
Also, I think you should be commended on your responsible topic title. Normally you'd see something like "ESPN discusses competitive SC2!" in this scenario. :p
Lol this is really cool. Glad you made a post about it OP. Good to know that more and more people are getting exposure to the game, and to E-Sports in general.
Decently big deal in my opinion. ESPN is basically the pinnacle of "cool" in American sports culture, so the fact that he mentioned SC with just a small dose of "I know this is nerdy but..." definitely helps legitimize it.
On May 08 2012 09:55 AKomrade wrote: Hahaha, #TMI. He knows its dangerous waters mentioning a video game outside of the mainstream on ESPN radio. Awesome that he watches the game though. Might be one of the heavy pushers at ESPN Studios talking to Sundance.
I'd be shocked if he had even minor input to any ESPN operation of which he isn't a part.
On May 08 2012 11:24 Befree wrote: That's pretty cool to hear . I wonder if anyone will call in on the subject in the future.
Also, I think you should be commended on your responsible topic title. Normally you'd see something like "ESPN discusses competitive SC2!" in this scenario. :p
LOL, I actually typed that out but realized how misleading that could be :p
On May 08 2012 09:55 AKomrade wrote: Hahaha, #TMI. He knows its dangerous waters mentioning a video game outside of the mainstream on ESPN radio. Awesome that he watches the game though. Might be one of the heavy pushers at ESPN Studios talking to Sundance.
I'd be shocked if he had even minor input to any ESPN operation of which he isn't a part.
Sundance actually talking about communicating with ESPN in the past...it was the eSports panel a couple of months ago when he mentioned it. That link to Sundance's recent twitter happened to come only a couple of hours after the ESPN SC shoutout. It might have nothing to do with it or it might have a real connection. Either way it's cool to see in something mainstream.
I find watching SC2 akin to watching any of the sports I love. We're really all just sitting down to watch our favorite players/teams duke it out. Not much of a difference honestly, it's just Starcraft is played virtually rather than physically. Only natural that someone from ESPN (sports nerd) would understand our "nerdyness" when it comes to ESPORTS.
On May 08 2012 09:55 AKomrade wrote: Hahaha, #TMI. He knows its dangerous waters mentioning a video game outside of the mainstream on ESPN radio. Awesome that he watches the game though. Might be one of the heavy pushers at ESPN Studios talking to Sundance.
I'd be shocked if he had even minor input to any ESPN operation of which he isn't a part.
Sundance actually talking about communicating with ESPN in the past...it was the eSports panel a couple of months ago when he mentioned it. That link to Sundance's recent twitter happened to come only a couple of hours after the ESPN SC shoutout. It might have nothing to do with it or it might have a real connection. Either way it's cool to see in something mainstream.
Doug Gottlieb might know about future projects and such (hence the correlation), but I highly doubt he has any say whatsoever.
On May 08 2012 12:29 Blennd wrote: Decently big deal in my opinion. ESPN is basically the pinnacle of "cool" in American sports culture, so the fact that he mentioned SC with just a small dose of "I know this is nerdy but..." definitely helps legitimize it.
He seems like he wants to let people know about it, which is so awesome! hurray
I gotta feel for Gottlieb. I've got Starcraft friends and sports friends, but none of them are interested in both (many of them play LoL). If I were him, I'd be scared of being shouted down by the producers. "[Irrational, stereotyped discrimination of video games]!!"
I think a lot of you guys got "jocks" pegged completely wrong. I'm a huge sports fanatic and have been all of my life. Playing, watching, talking sports is what I've been about. As have most of my friends. Its those same friends that I game with too. We grew up playing basketball and Halo together. And a lot of professional athletes are the same way. I always see athletes talking about gaming on twitter. Yeah its usually console shooters like CoD, but its still gaming.
Just last year we saw Hank Basket, an NFL WR, at an MLG and Gordon Hayward, an NBA player, at IPL3. Some people here are making gaming sound like its weird and looked down on, when in reality its extremely popular and more people game in some way than not.
On May 08 2012 14:57 jmbthirteen wrote: I think a lot of you guys got "jocks" pegged completely wrong. I'm a huge sports fanatic and have been all of my life. Playing, watching, talking sports is what I've been about. As have most of my friends. Its those same friends that I game with too. We grew up playing basketball and Halo together. And a lot of professional athletes are the same way. I always see athletes talking about gaming on twitter. Yeah its usually console shooters like CoD, but its still gaming.
Just last year we saw Hank Basket, an NFL WR, at an MLG and Gordon Hayward, an NBA player, at IPL3. Some people here are making gaming sound like its weird and looked down on, when in reality its extremely popular and more people game in some way than not.
Gaming is popular, but competitive gaming is not. It's one thing to hang out with your friends and play Halo or Super Smash, it's quite another to call them over to watch he GSL or MLG.
And I think "jock" in may ways is somewhat of an outdated term, but the current incarnation is conflated with "frat boy". A jock in the 80s was basically a nerd hating sports guy, typically a villainous sort, although not always. They were popular, and rarely smart (this of course by stereotype only, not in actuality). Nowadays, a jock might be in to nerd stuff and has just as good of a likelihood to be smart. That part of the stereotype is mostly over, but when people talk about a "typical jock" they really mean the modern day "fart boy", who is basically the 80s style jock only without the specific nerd hating. It's aggressive, sex obsessed guys that don't give a shit about anything in the long term, who also usually end up in business, finance, or McDonalds.
It's not really about accuracy, it's just a common term that people use. It's kind of like hipster, which in reality doesn't mean absolutely anything and no one self-identifies as a hipster, but has a common connotation of being in to "indie", "retro", and "ironic shit", and against "the mainstream". There are very few actual hipsters of this specific type, but there are a wide group of people that are called hipsters, similar how to there are very few jocks of the specific type outlined above, but there are a wide group of people that are called jocks. *shrugs* It is what it is.
On May 08 2012 14:57 jmbthirteen wrote: I think a lot of you guys got "jocks" pegged completely wrong. I'm a huge sports fanatic and have been all of my life. Playing, watching, talking sports is what I've been about. As have most of my friends. Its those same friends that I game with too. We grew up playing basketball and Halo together. And a lot of professional athletes are the same way. I always see athletes talking about gaming on twitter. Yeah its usually console shooters like CoD, but its still gaming.
Just last year we saw Hank Basket, an NFL WR, at an MLG and Gordon Hayward, an NBA player, at IPL3. Some people here are making gaming sound like its weird and looked down on, when in reality its extremely popular and more people game in some way than not.
Gaming is popular, but competitive gaming is not. It's one thing to hang out with your friends and play Halo or Super Smash, it's quite another to call them over to watch he GSL or MLG.
And I think "jock" in may ways is somewhat of an outdated term, but the current incarnation is conflated with "frat boy". A jock in the 80s was basically a nerd hating sports guy, typically a villainous sort, although not always. They were popular, and rarely smart (this of course by stereotype only, not in actuality). Nowadays, a jock might be in to nerd stuff and has just as good of a likelihood to be smart. That part of the stereotype is mostly over, but when people talk about a "typical jock" they really mean the modern day "fart boy", who is basically the 80s style jock only without the specific nerd hating. It's aggressive, sex obsessed guys that don't give a shit about anything in the long term, who also usually end up in business, finance, or McDonalds.
It's not really about accuracy, it's just a common term that people use. It's kind of like hipster, which in reality doesn't mean absolutely anything and no one self-identifies as a hipster, but has a common connotation of being in to "indie", "retro", and "ironic shit", and against "the mainstream". There are very few actual hipsters of this specific type, but there are a wide group of people that are called hipsters, similar how to there are very few jocks of the specific type outlined above, but there are a wide group of people that are called jocks. *shrugs* It is what it is.
I would disagree about there not being a cross-over. Athletes are extremely competitive people. I remember in my baseball days, we used to take xbox's with us on road trips and LAN 4v4 Halo during the downtime. When my baseball career ended prematurely due to injury, I found an outlet in competitive gaming. Several of my former teammates are incredibly good gamers because they used it as a competitive outlet as well. A few of them put together a 300+ game winning streak in MW2 last year. The mentality is already there, and a lot of them have good hand/eye coordination.
No, it's not going to be as big as the NFL or anything, but I could definitely see it getting bigger than say... the WNBA or professional LaCrosse.
I was the guy that emailed ESPN Radio. Here is what my full email said:
"From: David Schmidt [mailto:david.schmidt{at}evercor.com] Sent: Monday, May 07, 2012 2:50 PM To: 'DougGottlieb{at}ESPNRadio.com' Subject: Why I watch football...
I watch football because I appreciate the strategy and the mental aspect. Watching a quarterback slice up a defense or a defense confuse an offence fascinates me.
Interestingly enough, one of my favorite other things to watch is competitive play of Starcraft. Starcraft is a real-time computer strategy game that is a mental chess battle that is far more visually interesting and fast-pace than watching a chess match.
Seeing players use their physical skill and decision making to back other players into an unwinnable corner is the ultimate reality TV. Reality TV that actually is real."
Can't wait for the day when SC2 is mainstream. Don't see it happening this year but next year has a lot of things converging to make it the best shot that SC has ever had - at least in the US.
On May 12 2012 11:53 DRob wrote: I was the guy that emailed ESPN Radio. Here is what my full email said:
"From: David Schmidt [mailto:david.schmidt{at}evercor.com] Sent: Monday, May 07, 2012 2:50 PM To: 'DougGottlieb{at}ESPNRadio.com' Subject: Why I watch football...
I watch football because I appreciate the strategy and the mental aspect. Watching a quarterback slice up a defense or a defense confuse an offence fascinates me.
Interestingly enough, one of my favorite other things to watch is competitive play of Starcraft. Starcraft is a real-time computer strategy game that is a mental chess battle that is far more visually interesting and fast-pace than watching a chess match.
Seeing players use their physical skill and decision making to back other players into an unwinnable corner is the ultimate reality TV. Reality TV that actually is real."
Can't wait for the day when SC2 is mainstream. Don't see it happening this year but next year has a lot of things converging to make it the best shot that SC has ever had - at least in the US.
Edited your post to obscure the email addresses a bit so you and Doug don't find your inboxes filled with spambot ads. Hope you don't mind. Cool story, by the way, thanks for clearing that up for the thread.
On May 12 2012 11:53 DRob wrote: I was the guy that emailed ESPN Radio. Here is what my full email said:
"From: David Schmidt [mailto:david.schmidt{at}evercor.com] Sent: Monday, May 07, 2012 2:50 PM To: 'DougGottlieb{at}ESPNRadio.com' Subject: Why I watch football...
I watch football because I appreciate the strategy and the mental aspect. Watching a quarterback slice up a defense or a defense confuse an offence fascinates me.
Interestingly enough, one of my favorite other things to watch is competitive play of Starcraft. Starcraft is a real-time computer strategy game that is a mental chess battle that is far more visually interesting and fast-pace than watching a chess match.
Seeing players use their physical skill and decision making to back other players into an unwinnable corner is the ultimate reality TV. Reality TV that actually is real."
Can't wait for the day when SC2 is mainstream. Don't see it happening this year but next year has a lot of things converging to make it the best shot that SC has ever had - at least in the US.
Wait so Gottlieb was just quoting you? As in he doesn't actually watch SC? Well that's sort of disappointing.
I'm learning to treat SC2 like any other interest that I have in my life. As a married business owner I got over the embarrasement of watching people play video games. I tell people it is like watching chess in real-time.
For SC2 to go mainstream it is going to have to be treated not like a "nerd thing" but interesting entertainment. For SC2 to be mainstream it will need to be a bit less hardcore although the hardcore people like us will always have places like TL to hang out at although the broadcasts (on TV) will have to be more accessible.
The key to SC2 going mainstream is connecting SC2 events with other things that are already mainstream. This means: -- Mainstream advertisers / sponsors -- Stars and celebrities not related to esports attending. This pulls in fans of those stars and gives validation to a mainstream audiance of the event. Event organizers should look for ways to invite or welcome well known people from outside esports as a way to expand audience reach -- Growth of SC2 media that covers the events in a mainstream fashion. That makes it easy to learn the basics of the game (without ever playing) and makes it easy to get to know the players, understand who is good, and what events matter most, why they matter, and how to access them. -- Finding a way to ultimately work off of a model that is not pay-per-view. PPV can work in niche areas and will work for SC2 if SC2 is to stay confined to the hardcore gaming fans population but an ads based, and attendance model that most professional sports seem necessary for wide acceptance. People new to the sport have a hard time paying for something they don't know if they like. But they may watch something free and get hooked. The SD = free, HD = pay model is probably the best happy medium at this point.
I know my thoughts here change the topic slightly but I wanted to share them as it fits with the SC2 going mainstream discussion.
On May 08 2012 09:55 AKomrade wrote: Hahaha, #TMI. He knows its dangerous waters mentioning a video game outside of the mainstream on ESPN radio. Awesome that he watches the game though. Might be one of the heavy pushers at ESPN Studios talking to Sundance.
I'd be shocked if he had even minor input to any ESPN operation of which he isn't a part.
Sundance actually talking about communicating with ESPN in the past...it was the eSports panel a couple of months ago when he mentioned it. That link to Sundance's recent twitter happened to come only a couple of hours after the ESPN SC shoutout. It might have nothing to do with it or it might have a real connection. Either way it's cool to see in something mainstream.
Doug Gottlieb might know about future projects and such (hence the correlation), but I highly doubt he has any say whatsoever.
I'm pretty certain any talents don't really know about future projects at ESPN.. not yet anyways.
eSports is a very "tough sell" to traditional sports fans.
However, this is where Starcraft's age and brand name strength shine through. There are thousands of 30+ middle managers that are now in decision making positions through out the corporate world that have fond memories of Starcraft 1.
On May 08 2012 09:55 AKomrade wrote: Might be one of the heavy pushers at ESPN Studios talking to Sundance.
Misinformation is cool.
Nah man, speculation is cool. It would be misinformation if he presented it as some kind of hard fact. He didn't tho. He said "might". Personally I don't think it's too insane to connect that guy, being from ESPN, with Sundance, who allegedly is in contact with guys at ESPN.
So not only did he not actually mention Starcraft on his own, but he took the time to mention that the letter was a "TMI" to boot. He indirectly insulted the guy for mentioning his love of Starcraft after reading the letter.
On May 08 2012 14:57 jmbthirteen wrote: I think a lot of you guys got "jocks" pegged completely wrong. I'm a huge sports fanatic and have been all of my life. Playing, watching, talking sports is what I've been about. As have most of my friends. Its those same friends that I game with too. We grew up playing basketball and Halo together. And a lot of professional athletes are the same way. I always see athletes talking about gaming on twitter. Yeah its usually console shooters like CoD, but its still gaming.
Just last year we saw Hank Basket, an NFL WR, at an MLG and Gordon Hayward, an NBA player, at IPL3. Some people here are making gaming sound like its weird and looked down on, when in reality its extremely popular and more people game in some way than not.
Gaming is popular, but competitive gaming is not. It's one thing to hang out with your friends and play Halo or Super Smash, it's quite another to call them over to watch he GSL or MLG.
And I think "jock" in may ways is somewhat of an outdated term, but the current incarnation is conflated with "frat boy". A jock in the 80s was basically a nerd hating sports guy, typically a villainous sort, although not always. They were popular, and rarely smart (this of course by stereotype only, not in actuality). Nowadays, a jock might be in to nerd stuff and has just as good of a likelihood to be smart. That part of the stereotype is mostly over, but when people talk about a "typical jock" they really mean the modern day "fart boy", who is basically the 80s style jock only without the specific nerd hating. It's aggressive, sex obsessed guys that don't give a shit about anything in the long term, who also usually end up in business, finance, or McDonalds.
It's not really about accuracy, it's just a common term that people use. It's kind of like hipster, which in reality doesn't mean absolutely anything and no one self-identifies as a hipster, but has a common connotation of being in to "indie", "retro", and "ironic shit", and against "the mainstream". There are very few actual hipsters of this specific type, but there are a wide group of people that are called hipsters, similar how to there are very few jocks of the specific type outlined above, but there are a wide group of people that are called jocks. *shrugs* It is what it is.
I would disagree about there not being a cross-over. Athletes are extremely competitive people. I remember in my baseball days, we used to take xbox's with us on road trips and LAN 4v4 Halo during the downtime. When my baseball career ended prematurely due to injury, I found an outlet in competitive gaming. Several of my former teammates are incredibly good gamers because they used it as a competitive outlet as well. A few of them put together a 300+ game winning streak in MW2 last year. The mentality is already there, and a lot of them have good hand/eye coordination.
No, it's not going to be as big as the NFL or anything, but I could definitely see it getting bigger than say... the WNBA or professional LaCrosse.
Lacrosse? Hell no. I don't think so. The NLL and other leagues are doing just fine and the registration for it is huge in the States and Canada.
EPT![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/OwWWb.png)
