eSports
events that granted those teams
as much exposure as the top
tier events.
COGnitive
Gaming
is
one of the top
organizations
in
SMITE, and they have seen
whole teams dropped and new
ones picked up. David Fry, COG’s
CIO, said, “It’s business. I like
Shing and Allied, and I respect
them as great players and hope
they see the same. They were
probably angry though, and
rightfully so. The difficult thing
with eSports teams is that it’s
not like my sports management
background. Teams and players
don’t come and go much here,
where as in football they shift
frequently.” David also spoke
about the future of SMITE as
a sport and what the biggest
pitfalls were for competitive
players and teams. “Challenges
start and finish at the same
point. In America, being a
professional gamer is not a job.
For this reason alone keeping
a highly competitive team
together is problematic.” David
went on to explain how if eSports
developed along the lines of
Issue 1 • May 2014
o t h e r professional
sports,
it
would
improve the lev [و ^B