B/R Weekly Rushdown: Miami Heat Buy Slice of Misfits, Dota 2 Rosters Locked
Teams buying in, teams selling out and teams backing down. It was quite the week in esports. With the Counter-Strike universe gearing up for the ESL Pro League, the Dota 2 world officially on the road to the Kiev Major and a tidal wave of League of Legends action starting up in a week and a half, there would've been plenty to talk about as is.
This week, however, saw a massive amount of business-end news steal the show. So what possibly could have been big enough to take over the Weekly Rushdown? Read on and find out.
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Dota 2 Rosters Locked
Dota 2 teams are packed up and driving on the road to the Kiev Major. The first stop came on Monday with the major registration "roster locks" occurring, determining which teams will be eligible for invites to the tournament. Naturally, a lot of interesting news came out surrounding this. Here's the abridged version:
- The North American scene added two interesting new teams in Team Onyx (led by NA veterans Mason Venne, Jimmy "DemoN" Ho and Sam "BuLba" Sosale) and WanteD, founded by former Evil Geniuses captain Peter "ppd" Dager.
- Former Team Liquid mid Adrian "FATA-" Trinks is back with a team of his own, B)ears.
- China's Vici Gaming and LGD Gaming seemingly shored up one of the teams under their organizational umbrella (Team VG.J and LGD.cn, respectively) at the expense of their other squads (VG and LGD Forever Young).
Also worth noting is that Chinese powerhouse Newbee announced a new squad named Newbee Boss. The team includes Dota legends Zhang "xiao8" Ning, Wong "ChuaN" Hock Chuan and Luo "Ferrari_430" Feichi alongside the first ever woman to sign with a major Dota 2 organization, Bi "Axx" Xia. They did not register in time, however, so they will have to work their way into Kiev through the open qualifiers.
That's just the tip of the proverbial iceberg, however. Make sure to check out Bleacher Report's full breakdown of the Spring Shuffle and the announcement of Newbee Boss.
Miami Heat Buy Stake in Misfits
Another week, another traditional sports team investing capital in esports. This time? According to a press release on NBA.com, the Miami Heat have purchased a stake in European LoL, Hearthstone, Overwatch and Smash Bros. organization Misfits.
"The Miami HEAT pride ourselves on being innovative in all aspects of sports and business," said chief executive officer Nick Arison. "For us, it made perfect sense to partner with Misfits, a young and ambitious franchise in a sport that is blazing a trail in terms of 21st century recreational competition amongst Millennials."
Misfits CEO and co-founder Ben Spoont added, "Misfits is thrilled to be partnering with the HEAT organization. ... This partnership will be the catalyst and foundation to our continued expansion of the Misfits organization into a global esports brand and company."
According to the release, this marriage will go beyond what esports fans have seen thus far as the deal "calls for the HEAT to assist in all duties including marketing, branding, promotion, retail, digital and sponsorship activation on behalf of the franchise, and to cross-promote the HEAT and Misfits."
What that means, and what that entails for fans going forward, remains to be seen. Once again, though, this shows that business is boomin' in esports.
Lionsgate Buys Stake in Immortals
Same idea here! Entertainment and media juggernaut Lionsgate announced on Tuesday that it has acquired a stake in Immortals.
"We’re delighted to be an early mover in a market that has the potential to transform the face of sports entertainment," said Lionsgate's president of Interactive Ventures & Games, Peter Levin (h/t VentureBeat.com's Dean Takahashi). "Our involvement in eSports creates tremendous opportunities to develop new content and utilize our suite of distribution platforms for a coveted consumer demographic with compelling engagement metrics. Collaborating with an elite group of partners, the combination of the Lionsgate and Immortals brands will be formidable."
With stakeholders in a number of industries, Immortals, which fields rosters in LoL, Overwatch, Counter-Strike and Smash Bros., has the potential to transform into one of the top brands in esports. Its ties to the NBA and a major media company put it in a unique position relative to other organizations and gives it a mainstream platform its competition just can't replicate.
As discussed by DotEsports.com's Nicole Carpenter, Pilgrim Studios—a television production company which is under Lionsgate's ownership umbrella—has worked with ESL in the past. That makes it easy to wonder if there might just be some more esports content on television in the near future and if that will heavily feature the team.
PEA's CS:GO League Closes Before Ever Opening
Players' rights. The oversaturation of esports content. The changing role of teams in the industry. The vacuum left by publishers that don't form their own leagues. These are just a few of the topics that were touched upon during the battle between the PEA, an association of seven major esports organizations, and the players under their umbrella.
Prompted by the PEA's attempt to pull its players out of the ESL Pro League (a competitor to its own potential league) in December, this epic came to the fore of the entire esports world and quickly became one of 2016's biggest stories. After a great deal of back-and-forth between the two sides, it seems as though an agreement has been reached.
According to a statement from the PEA acquired by Mashable.com, the PEA's plans to start a league of its own have been shelved...at least for now. "Since the time of the original announcement of the PEA CS:GO league, it has become clear to the PEA organizations that there isn’t sufficient financial support in the ecosystem ... to profitably operate a third prominent online league," it said in its statement.
The outcome isn't especially surprising. The players were remarkably quick to organize, unify and win over public support through a series of open letters published by esports veteran Scott "SirScoots" Smith. That quick action put the PEA in a difficult position, and less-than-graceful handling of the situation resulted in some figures taking a firm shot to the PR department (particularly Team SoloMid).
Worth noting, however, is that the move isn't necessarily purely altruistic.
"[ESL and WESA] raised their prize pool from $750,000 to $1,000,000 per season and recently offered to pay 10 percent of [ESL Pro League] gross revenue to non-WESA teams, half of which was promised to the seven PEA organizations and players," the statement continued. "They say that this new revenue-sharing will be available only if the PEA organizations agree not to run a PEA CS:GO competition for two years and also commit to play in [ESL Pro League] for two years."
What the future holds for PEA is currently unknown. It left the door open for a move from CS:GO to a different title, but what other title that could be remains a mystery. Still, there is definite value to organizations, fans and, despite all this ugliness, the players in the foundation of a team-operated league.
This chapter has ended, but the story will inevitably continue through 2017 and, probably, well beyond that.
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.jpg?w=600 "Offseason Moves for Every Team 👉")