In 2016, there has been a constant overlap between traditional sports and the gaming world. Current athletes, retired ones, U.S. professional sports team owners and franchises themselves have all made their way into eSports, a coined phrase that has generated an increasing amount of buzz over the past year.
Kansas City Chiefs offensive tackle Mitch Schwartz, a long-time gamer himself, recently weighed in on everything eSports with SportTechie. The Pacific Palisades, Calif. native discussed the growing gaming scene in mainstream media, how much eSports discussion there is in NFL locker rooms, if he could ever see himself investing in a team, and who is the best athlete he has ever competed against.
1) How did you first get into gaming and eSports? What was the first game you played, and when would that have been?
I’ve been into gaming for as long as I can remember. It started out with original Nintendo, playing Mario and Duck Hunt. Then I played a lot of Roger Clemens’ MVP Baseball against my brother, who had to have beaten me every single time. I could have been up by 16 going into the 9th, but he’d always seem to beat me. This would have been when I was as young as three or four or five, so in the early 90s. NES progressed into PlayStation, Dreamcast, Xbox, PS2, Xbox 360, PS3 (strictly for MLB The Show), and now Xbox One. Along with handhelds like GameBoy, PSP, (3)DS. I’ve played a little bit of PC but that was more when I was younger and with games like Oregon Trail and SimCity. In terms of eSports, I’ve become aware of them over the last few years. I got into the COD MW2 YouTube scene and then just kind of have followed online gaming ever since. I’ve never played CS:GO or LoL so I don’t watch those as much because I don’t have the familiarity with the game.
2) What is your favorite game right now, and how often do you play?
Current favorite game is Destiny, and I play every day if time permits. It’s a really fun and addicting game, there’s always new and more things to do, so I’ve been playing that a lot since it’s release.
3) Who is the best gamer on the Kansas City Chiefs right now? The best gamer/athlete you’ve ever played against?
That’s a good question, I don’t know too much about the gaming scene here just because I’ve been so involved into Destiny and haven’t played too many of the other competitive multiplayers. The best, or at least most dedicated, athlete gamer I’ve been around is Cleveland Browns tight end Gary Barnidge. He plays most of the new releases and even used to write up reviews of them. His gaming collection is enormous.
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4) In 2016, there have been a number of NBA owners and current/ex players getting involved with eSports teams and franchises (See Exhibits A, B, C, D and E). What are your initial thoughts on the gaming frenzy happening over the past 11 months?
It’s not terribly surprising to see, just given how much support there is/was for YouTube and now Twitch. The high level streamers get crazy amounts of views for just a random Thursday night at 2 a.m., so to think that you wouldn’t be able to fill up a basketball arena or something of that nature to watch the two best teams in the world compete is a little naive. And clearly with the high prize money and amount of money being invested, it’s a growing industry. These owners are good businessmen. They wouldn’t get involved unless they saw serious potential, and it looks like the industry is just getting started.
5) How much discussion is there in NFL locker rooms about NFL players/owners getting involved with teams/gamers and investing in eSports?
There isn’t too much discussion about that aspect of it. I think it more gets talked about when we see it on TV and it gets the skeptical “is this really a sport” discussion going.
6) Would you ever personally consider investing in a team/franchise? Why or why not?
I would have to do more research and get some people involved who have much more knowledge on the business side of things but if the right opportunity presented itself I’d definitely consider it.
7) On the social media side of things … what is your favorite platform right now and why?
Probably Twitter, just because of the interaction you can have, and also the ability to reach the highest number of people the quickest. I do like to do football commentary and help teach people more about football, and I’ve always gotten good feedback and response from those, so that’s a big plus to Twitter. Same with doing random Q+As, it’s just a great avenue to connect with the people that follow you.