Recognizing Our Esports Team
“I guess I’d say the most important role in esports is teamwork,” said Carlos Rodriguez, a senior at Sedro-Woolley High School and a fourth-year esports player. “You’re cooperating, working with your team, and [figuring] out what you can do to win a game or how to work and improve yourself as the team.”
Teamwork is an important asset when running an esports team, but it is still a challenge.
“Esports didn’t exist when I was in high school,” said Zachary Pope, assistant coach to the esports team and physics teacher at Sedro-Woolley High School. “So I don’t have a lot of memory of, you know, coaching the way that somebody who played baseball or football in high school might remember their coach’s drills, and so I’m having to invent a lot of things on my own.”
But even though a lot of work goes into an esports team, there are lots of things that the esports players think gets overlooked.
”The main thing I find is overlooked in esports is kinda just the team work that goes behind it,” said Jose Ramos, senior at Sedro-Woolley High School and fourth-year esports player. “Also the communication and the bonding that we have, at least that I’ve developed, I don’t know if anyone has the same experience.”
Even with the team working and bonding as a real team, there is one thing that most of the team can agree on: that esports doesn’t get enough credit.
”No, absolutely not,” said Pope when asked if esports gets enough credit as a actual sport. “Whenever they announce esports at one of the assemblies, I can see people sort of snickering in the crowd. I’ve had to fill questions from my own student about whether it counts as a sport and why we why we call it that, but I think there are plenty of valid reasons for esports to be a sport.”
