Storyline: Scheduled to launch in January ’17 the Professional eSports Association seeks to bring sanity to a domain characterized by chaos and confusion. Written by Spencer Fraseur, Clearwater, FL.
E-Sports is a relative unknown in the sports industry–even though teams. leagues, financial supporters, sponsors, and gaming companies have jumped in early in the history of this new, competitive sport.
Courtesy: kotaku.com
Among 15-30 year olds E-Sports is not necessarily new, but it certainly is fresh and entertaining. Billions of people have watched events through online streaming on Twitch. Tournaments draw upwards of 20,000 people. And companies and celebrities seek to become team owners and ink sponsorship deals.
But there is chaos and confusion, too. In what has become “The Wild West of Sports” rules change from league to league. Law and order is needed to bring order.
Enter The Professional eSports Association (PEA). Make no mistake, though, PEA is not a governing body. It is one of many leagues associated with E-Sports, including Major League Gaming, ESL Gaming, and League of Legends. But it remains to be seen whether the PEA can compete against these and many other leagues.
Courtesy: engadget.com
What separates PEA from other leagues is how the players are treated vs. the companies and sponsorships behind it. PEA has organized a Rules and Grievances Committee. Revenue within the PEA for winnings will be split 50/50 between the players and the organization.
We’ll see how things go when PEA launches its first season in January 2017.
