The following is in response to the Sports Media column “Turner looks beyond ELeague’s lower viewership numbers” in the Aug. 1-7 issue of SportsBusiness Journal.
I just read your commentary about “esports” in SBJ. Here is the REAL problem. So called esports are NOT sports at all as we both know. It is a form of electronic entertainment.
You and SBJ should but don’t have enough integrity to protect the most basic definition of sports, the concept of sports itself.
“Esports” is cynical marketing ploy because using the word “sports” gives this credibility it would not have otherwise. SBJ accepts this nonsense, for one reason, to keep advertisers like Turner happy and attract those who deal in “esports” as advertisers. If you accept these electronic games as “sports” then literally anything is sports … spelling bees, chess matches, cooking contests, competitive Monopoly, etc. They are all sports by your definition simply because they involve any kind of competition. Really?
Let me call your bluff if you are willing to respond: What is your definition of sports?
Here is mine very simply — any competition between individuals or teams that involves clearly physical, not sedentary, activity and that requires a specific defined space where this activity takes place.
Sitting in front of computer screens playing games does not qualify.
Arthur Piccolo
New York City
