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Rito why? Team franchising failing the fan base?

DrkNinja·11/23/2017, 2:27:24 AM·3 votes·1,313 views

I just would love to understand why it is Riot has turned their backs on some of the orgs that made the LCS what it is. As a follow up question why choose orgs that have never played a MOBA before? I feel like this was a sleight to not only the fans and players, but to the orgs that built their foundation on league. I'll discuss specifics below.

The orgs I feel were quintessential to the LCS are of course Immortals and Dignitas.

Immortals came in two years ago, four splits ago, and became one of the most formidable teams in the LCS leading to a record split of 17-1 which has yet to be broken to date. Immortals was also one of the first teams to be formed through a venture capitalist investment. Their formation changed the way LCS teams were viewed and their CEO Noah Winston was a big part influencing the eventual franchising of the LCS.

Dignitas is a team that is both very new and very old, but more importantly has a long history with the LCS even before it's formation into the LCS we know and love. Dignitas was an old team that was well known for taking risky Baron plays, and were home to the likes of Voyboy, imaqtpie, Jatt, Shiphtur, and Scarra. They were then bought out my the Philadelphia 76ers and enjoyed some measure of success over the last 3 splits.

Now with that said, Riot have a very vague answer of, and I'm paraphrasing, "these teams don't have a strong enough brand nor the capital to comfortably provide the entry fee without crippling the org." Now I'm not sure about you but I believe the likes of the Philadelphia 76ers, Linkin Park, the Lionsgate Games president, and a chairman of Machinima.com can handle the financial investment required by Riot. As far as weak branding is concerned Immortals and Dignitas have a fat from weak brand, I don't even think it's worth entertaining.

Lastly let's talk about some of the new teams mainly Optic Gaming and 100 Thieves. Now being an ex amateur call of duty player I love both these orgs. Optic has one of the strongest brands in the entirety of esports and has won multiple call of duty world championships. 100 Thieves was founded by an ex Optic player Nadeshot, who led Optic to one of those world championship wins, so he is well aware of what an org needs from both the player and org perspectives. Now, neither of these orgs have ever been in an effort that wasn't FPS meaning they lack love for the game and the experience of playing the game. More so 100 Thieves failed to create a lasting COD team and has been serving as a brand for apparel as admitted by Nadeshot himself in his announcement video. Now I don't doubt that they will put every effort forward to make incredible orgs however they will never fully comprehend the game as the org owners have never played it or been apart of it's community. This is a lack of understand and passion for the game that Dignitas and Immortals would not have lacked.

Finally I want to address the coincidence that Immortals had just recently secureda spit in the Overwatch League as the Los Angeles Valiants. This some people have theorized is the specific reasoning behind Riot's dismissal of Immortals as they believe that Immortals could not accurately sustain being a franchised team in both games. I however believe Riot may even have a more petty reasoning behind their dismissal; with Immortals launching teams into DOTA 2, a competitor to LOL, and Overwatch maybe Rito doesn't want an org that directly sports it's competitors?

Either way as a huge Immortals fan I have been severely let down by Riot and seem to continue to be let down by them with their continual changes to appeal to the masses and not it's loyal fan base.

Thoughts? Comments? Concerns?

Are you disappointed in the franchising choices as well? Wish another team would have made it? Comment down below! <3

12 Comments

Miror B11/23/2017, 2:59:09 AM4 votes

The problem with franchising that I can see is two things:

A) The player salaries are going to reach a point in which they become almost "nonsensical" (that potentially being the case if we are to believe that steve is paying impact 1 meeeleon dollars a year)

B) Regions "out of the loop" when it comes to franchising are going to become barren wastelands of talent, EU slowly becoming this with Zven/Mithy apparently heading to richer waters and their former team replacing them with a botlane from the 6th-best EU team.

Kledy McKledFace11/23/2017, 2:37:47 AM2 votes

Because inverstors didn't want to go for IMT or DIG ? Here you have 3 NBA franchises wanting to invest in esports versus a poor man's company.... I'd go all the way tith the Knicks owners, the Houston Rockets owner and the Golden State warrior owner...

Also, in China, they will be testing City located teams. If it works they'll implement this ideology to other region (like in NHL/NBA/MLD/NFL etc...).

So you gotta find owners that have already strong finance + maybe locate a team in the near future (probably 2019). IMT and DIG both lives in LA just like most teams right now but if you take a stronger team, take CLG or TSM and ask Madison Square Garden manager to pick a team to invest and support throughout season 8, who would you go for? TSM C9 CLG or IMT DIG? This wasn't a single year decision, its a 5-10 year decision.

hotarse11/23/2017, 5:41:45 PM1 votes

No one ever reads between the lines these days. They take everything for face value cuz no one teaches critical thinking skills anymore. Riot's move against those orgs are entirely to do with personal squabbles that we are not and never will be privy to. We at least, well those who bothered to be educated on the matter, got to see evidence of the squabbly nature of Riot through the Riot-Monte interactions of which several emails were leaked proving Riot's grudge against Monte for even wanting to maintain a friendly relationship with another person that Riot hates and maintains a grudge against. The company is stupid. People who support the company are stupid. It is a cult. It is no better than EA. People just don't see it yet because there aren't any figure heads saying this for the dumb masses to follow.

Supersmarty11/24/2017, 1:43:04 AM1 votes

They're franchising because as the fanbase grows, the infrastructure needs to grow with it. Franchising seems bad at first, but I as a fan say its a guarantee people who's team left will no doubt latch on to another team, due to the fact they'll be around for as long as league survives which from what I'm seeing will be at least the next 20 years.