Press Play to Start: Moist Esports paves the way for a new form of pro-gaming

There is nothing like a midterm to knock me off my high horse. As I go from office hour to office hour, I’m forced to recognize the importance of fundamentals. If you don’t practice them from time to time, your entire knowledge about the field will fall apart (one look at my grades should serve as enough proof of that).

All this to say: I’m going back to the basics.

That’s right: no business theory, no content trends nor anything of the sorts. Just pure, simple esports.

And what better place to start than the most recent Smash Ultimate Summit tournament? 

Those who watched it will know exactly why I’ve decided to talk about it. After all, it was unique in so many ways. 

It had the largest prize pool out of any Smash tournament to date; players were chosen based on popular vote and it had a series of crowdfunding goals set out during the initial campaign.

But I’m not here to talk about any of that. Instead, I’ll be focusing on one particular esports team that made its debut in this tournament and, if successful, might reshape the future of the industry.

Of course, I’m talking about Moist Esports. 

I know that it sounds a bit … off-kilter. But the team is named after its creator: Charles “MoistCr1TiKal” White Jr., a famous Twitch streamer and Youtuber. 

According to a video he released on his channel, White was approached by pro Super Smash Bros. Ultimate player Kolawole “Kola” Aideyan. Initially, Aideyan asked for White’s help to gather enough votes and join the tournament. White told Aideyan he’d like to do more than just that, and asked if he would also be willing to join his brand-new esports team. Aideyan said yes and — ta-da! — Moist Esports was born. 

At first glance, this origin story doesn’t seem too interesting. After all, it’s just a streamer starting an esports team. But think about it for a second.

A streamer started their own esports team.

That is almost unprecedented in the history of esports as a whole. While content creators have certainly signed contracts with organizations before, almost none of them have bypassed the threshold and gotten full rein over the team. White, by starting his organization from scratch, not only has put that issue to rest but is also constantly paving the way for future streamers to follow his lead. 

But should they? Why is a streamer running an esports team beneficial in the first place?

Well, I can’t say that it will always be. Regardless of how you feel about them, esports executives usually run the company for a reason. You need someone with experience with the corporate world to make the entire operation viable. Still, Moist Esports has shown that there are some benefits to having a popular content creator running the team. 

First of all, since the streamer has a large following, the team can save loads of money in marketing and overall publicity. As long as the streamer reminds their audience and showcases the team’s content on their broadcast, thousands of people will see it. 

A great practical example of these benefit is the boost Aideyan received in votes after he signed into the team, which allowed him to participate in the tournament. 

Secondly, if a popular content creator runs the team, this means that their main source of revenue does not come from the athletes they sign. Thus, the organization has a lot less incentive to take a higher percentage of their athletes’ prizes. 

In Moist Esports’ case, they do not take any amount from the players’ earnings; all the money an athlete receives from a tournament is theirs to keep. It doesn’t take a genius to understand why many pro-gamers, especially those who play games with relatively lower winnings, would be interested in that.

Naturally, this sort of setup is not viable for every single context. If you plan on becoming a huge esports team that has international reach and plays a plethora of games, you’re likely better off having an executive as a CEO. 

Still, thanks to Moist Esports, there is now an alternative path toward professional gaming that should be attractive to many athletes out there. Of course, its influence in the esports world depends on its overall success. 

Only time will tell whether the team goes down in history as a trailblazer or some failed experiment. But as things currently stand, I can not help but echo the words of the team’s founder so well repeated throughout the internet:

“Woo Yeah Baby! That’s what I’ve been waiting for.”

Guilherme Guerreiro is a junior writing about esports. His column, “Press Play to Start,” runs every other Wednesday.