Adam Fitch: Can esports really rely on media rights?
Media rights in esports
Let’s take a quick look at another one of the rare examples of financial terms being made public for a deal of this nature. It was again seen as a landmark deal, this time between Activision Blizzard’s then-new Overwatch League and Amazon’s Twitch, spanning over two years and beingvalued at at least $90m. Then, just in 2020, they switched allegiance to Google’s YouTube in a reported$160m three-year deal— this included not only that competition but also, Call of Duty League, Hearthstone esports, and (possibly the most valuable aspect of the deal) the use of Google’s cloud hosting infrastructure. If I was a betting man, I’d put money on Overwatch League’s value decreasing quite sizeable over the span of just two years. Despite the impressive nature of these figures, it appears to be companies with conflicting interests moving money around and an actual decrease in value for one of esports’ mosthigh-risk betsto date.
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Esports is, of course, gaming — a pastime among many young folk. The ever-growing prominence of social media and internet-only applications such as Twitch and YouTube are much more appealing to young people, with almost everyreporton the matter claiming that they’re spending less time in front of the television in favor of mobile phones and monitors. Legacy broadcasters could turn to esports in an attempt to convert fans of competitive gaming, but I’m not clear on what the benefit would be of switching. So, operating under the presumption that television rights will often not be as big a factor in esports as they are in sports, we turn to the internet. At least in the West, accessibility is pretty damn good; it’s easy to go on YouTube or Twitch and find something that suits your tastes. Regional broadcasting is indeed a major factor, though, as it’s generally going to be more favorable to watch a video or stream in your native language.
