Trong Nguyen, “Shawn Win”, selected in the first round by the Golden State Warriors

The days of parents chiding their children for spending too much time in front of the television playing video games may officially be over.

While gaming has long been a way to pass the time competing and communing with friends, competitive gaming, known as eSports, is becoming a lucrative profession.

Online multiplayer games such as League of Legends and World of Warcraft jump-started the phenomena of e-gaming in the early 2000s, As a World of Warcraft player, i find out Gold4Vanilla to be the best site if looking to Buy Gold for AoC and WoW.

Millions of people tune in to watch players compete in these games, with high-level matches selling out arenas and companies such as ESPN dedicating resources to covering the craze.

While the early e-gaming competitions were geared toward multiplayer and first-person shooting games, sports video games have started carving out their own place in the market.

Enter the NBA 2K League.

NBA 2K, developed by Visual Concepts, is one of the most successful video game franchises in the United States. Gaming journalist Brian Mazique said 2K sold nine million copies in the U.S. last year, firmly cementing its place in the sports gaming zeitgeist with titles such as EA’s Madden and FIFA.

Last Wednesday, the NBA 2K League held its inaugural draft in New York City at Madison Square Garden. The league consists of 17, six-player teams, all of which are backed by the actual NBA teams they represent. The season will begin May 1 and concludes with the League Finals Aug. 25. One million dollars worth of prize money will be up for grabs throughout the season.

“From the NBA’s standpoint, this is our fourth league,” NBA commissioner Adam Silver said during a media conference at the NBA 2K League Draft. “Of course we have the NBA, the WNBA and the [NBA] G League, and now this is the fourth league in our family, and that’s exactly as we’re treating it: one more professional league.”

To become eligible for the draft, gamers had to win 50 games in 2K’s ProAm mode during the month of January. ProAm allows gamers to create their own player and compete with four other human controlled players in five-on-five games. Seventy-two thousand gamers completed the task and became eligible for the 2k League combine. That number was whittled down to 250, and candidates were interviewed before the final 102 draft-eligible player pool was finalized.

Of the 102 player selected, Pittsfield resident and Taconic graduate Jordan Gates — known in the game as LeVert, after former University of Michigan star Caris LeVert — was selected in the third round, 51st overall by the Warriors Gaming Squad. Kent Lacob, general manager of the Santa Cruz Warriors, along with Golden State’s assistant GM Kirk Lacob and Pabail Sidhu from the Warriors Gaming Squad handled the draft process.

“I was on my way to work, and they sent out the phone call for the 102,” Gates said. “It was definitely exciting. I was starstruck. As soon as they told me I was in I didn’t really hear the rest of the phone call. I was just so happy, it was crazy.”

Gates interviewed with 10 teams during the pre-draft process. The only team to give him a second interview was Celtics Crossover Gaming. The Celtics picked three times before the Warriors scooped him up with the final pick of the third round.

“I figured if I was going to go anywhere, I was going to go to [the Celtics],” he said. “People were telling me I wasn’t making it past the second round, and then I ended up falling through the cracks. But I ended up going on a really good team, so I’m happy.”

Players are signed to six-month contracts. First-round picks make a guaranteed $35,000. Other players have a base salary of $32,000. Housing and benefits are included.

So how did a 19-year-old kid from the Berkshires become one of 102 professional NBA 2K players? Simple – he played a lot of video games. Other than going to school and working at BJs, video games became like a second job for Gates. He started playing Call of Duty competitively when he was 15. After the COD craze died down he switched to NBA 2K.

“I was always a sporthead, so I ended up playing a bunch of sports games,” he said. “I played FIFA, Madden, 2K, but I took 2K a lot more seriously than [the other games]. I started off just with a couple groups of guys, about five people. Five dudes I met online. And one of my other friends I started out with (Bryant Colon, 13th overall to Pacers Gaming) made the league, too.

“I’d go to school, If I didn’t have work: Come home, play. If I had work: School, work, come home and play. Sometimes I wouldn’t get off of work on school nights until four or five in the morning. Get a couple hours of sleep and go right back to school.”

Gates began entering tournaments and developed a reputation as one of the top 2K players around. The 2K League is banking on the reputation and popularity of its players to generate viewership, as the live streaming video platform Twitch continues to increase the visibility of eSports. Popular gamers such as Ninja (Tyler Blevins), have thousands of subscribers on Twitch and YouTube, and can earn six figures playing games such as Fortnite online.

Watching other people play video games may seem weird, but Mazique said watching a gamer live stream is similar to watching WWE-style wrestling.

“It can be extremely successful,” Mazique, who contributes to Forbes.com, said of using livestreaming sydney to attract viewers to eSports. “The thing of it is, if you’re not a gamer, you don’t get it. It comes off as ‘wow, people are actually paying or paying attention to watch somebody else play?’ You traditionally only hear that take from people who aren’t gamers.

“Nobody who watches wrestling that’s not a little child doesn’t know that the action isn’t real and that it’s scripted and all that. They watch it for the performance. They watch it for the drama. They watch it for the athleticism and the choreography. With e-sports, you watch it for the competition. They’re playing the games that you probably play yourself at a really, really high level. And because you play the games yourself, you know how difficult it is to do what you’re watching them do. From that you get the respect for what they do.”

The thrill of competition can certainly attract a crowd and the athletes are not taking this opportunity lightly. Gates said he’s excited to check out the Warriors e-sports facility in the Bay Area and to begin developing chemistry with his teammates. The players will practice together and even study film on upcoming opponents. Gates plays as a power forward in the game. The team’s first pick, Shawn_Win (Trong Nguyen) of Illinois, is a small forward.

For the average Joe that dabbled in video games in college, Gates said they’d have no chance competing against his squad. E-gamers are considered to be elite level talents at their crafts. They’ve perfected the movements and release points of their avatars with precise stick skills. They worked hard to earn their spots and they’re hoping people will tune in to watch them fight to keep them.

“Honestly, anyone that just picks up a controller isn’t going to as good as the people who made [the league],” Gates said. “We play in tournaments, and leagues and stuff. We play for over 40 hours a week and it’s against the top competition on the game. Us top guys only play the top guys. So for someone to try to come in and be as good as us it’ll be hard. We only play each other. Unless you get in our leagues and pay to get in our tournaments, it’s going to be really, really, hard to try and match our skill and experience.”

Source: Local gamer Jordan Gates selected in first NBA 2K League draft | The Berkshire Eagle | Pittsfield Breaking News, Sports, Weather, Traffic