The Essendon Bombers have entered the world of esports by buying League of Legends team Abyss. In the announcement released on their website last night, the Bombers used the word ‘esports’ twenty times and got the capitalisation wrong every time.
Following the Adelaide Crows – who acquired Legacy Esports earlier this year – the Bombers have bought Abyss Esports Club to compete in League of Legends‘ Oceanic Pro League (OPL) and Oceanic Challenger League (OCL) next year. The purchase was done in partnership with Executive Sports and Entertainment.
Abyss players will don the sash as the esports team undergoes rebranding to become fully integrated into Essendon. They will also be relocated to Melbourne where the players will make use of the club’s facilities.
The world has a weird way of doing things, my childhood dream was to play for @EssendonFC, I just didn’t think that it was going to be playing league.
Excited to represent @AbyssESC and the club throughout 2018 https://t.co/1JDErdIk37— Rosey (@OCERosey) December 7, 2017
OPL is currently based out of Sydney and it is unclear how this move will affect the team’s participation in the competition.
In an announcement on the Essendon Bombers website Essendon Chief Marketing Officer, Justin Rodski said, “Esports teams are no different to any other professional sports club model and esports fans are no different to any other sports fans in their passion to support their team.”
“There is a rich and diverse community eco-system in esports and this is our opportunity to be culturally relevant to the millennial audience and engage a new fan base.”
The Bombers also insisted on capitalising the ‘S’ every time they wrote ‘esports’ in the announcement in contradiction with the Associated Press style guide and to the frustration of esports personality Paul “Redeye” Chaloner.
AP style is esports for competitive multiplayer video gaming. Use alternate forms like eSports or e-sports only if part of a formal name.
— AP Stylebook (@APStylebook) April 5, 2017
Esports is a portmanteau of ‘electronic’ and ‘sports’. If you wouldn’t capitalise the ‘S’ in ‘sports’ in a sentence, why would you do it when you cram it into another word? Although apparently this subject is still open to debate. Eventually people will realise that I’m right and treat it like every other portmanteau in the English language.
[via Reddit]
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