Recap: Purposefull Stories: Mental Health and Performance in Esports

Over the past few years, mental health in sports has become quite the hot topic. Everyone from Kevin Love in the NBA to Serena Williams in Tennis has helped bring this once taboo subject into the mainstream. And Esports, although still relatively new, is no exception.

On the last Purposefull Stories Webinar, 17 Sport cofounder Fabien Paget spoke to panel of some of the top professionals in Esports:

• Romain Bigeard, Business Development Manager at Riot Games
• Lars Christian Robl, Sports Psychologist & Performance Coach for Astralis, Origen & Future FC
• Ismael Pedraza: Performance Coach at Rogue Sports & PhD candidate in Sport Psychology.

The group dove deep on the subjects of mental health and performance covering the importance of systemic change, the necessity of boundaries, the pressures of performance and more.

Check out a few learnings and the full talk below —

Key Quote

“We, as organisations and psychologists around the players, have to help them answer the question: who am I when I’m not a gamer?” — Lars Christian Robl

Addressing the causes not just the symptoms

When it comes to mental health, the symptoms can often be obvious. Things like burnout, depression, and a drop in performance are unfortunately all too common in esports. But digging deeper, it’s clear that these are symptoms of much larger structural problems, and in order to solve those problems more effectively, organisations and psychologists need to focus on prevention and not just intervention. This means taking a deeper look at the expectations set for the players and developing a culture that helps them thrive such as giving the players space to build an identity outside of gaming, developing strategies to deal with the pressure of being an elite gamer and building a community of support.

Change needs to happen at a system level

Esports, like traditional sports, is much more than just the team you see on the pitch. A team’s success or failures relies on much more than just the players, and mental health issues are no exception. That means it’s the responsibility of the entire organisations — coaches, trainers, psychologists, PR and more — to be more cognizant of what is going on and their role in making the environment more supportive for these athletes. This also extends beyond just the organisation but to the league, in making sure the tournaments are professional and healthy, and even the game developers working towards creating a less toxic in-game environment.

These are just a small sample of the incredible insights from our panelists. Watch the full webinar below to learn even more.

*Unfortunately, we experienced technical difficulties with the zoom recording cutting out the introductions and Romain’s excellent primer on Esports.

We invite you to continue the conversation with us on our Sport 2.0: Slack Channel where we are bringing together the sporting community to discuss this topic and others like it.

17 Sport is the world’s first truly integrated sports impact company on a mission to build a positive future for the world through sport. We provide purpose led advisory, commercial and management solutions for brands, sports properties, athletes and non-profits wanting to manage their investments in sport in a more purposeful way. www.17-sport.com