Recently, ELV spoke with Kingsley Edwards about the future of esports here in Las Vegas. As the CEO of Leet.gg and co-owner of Overwatch Team Rogue, Kingsley is very knowledgeable on this subject and had a lot of insight to share with us. Here are some of the most exciting things we discussed. (You can read the full transcript of the interview here)
Who is Leet.gg
Leet.gg is currently one of the largest Esports organizers in Las Vegas. They run regular tournaments at both The Downtown Grand Underground, and Silver Sevens Casino, but they’re quickly branching out to other casinos across the strip.
Kingsley: Yeah so we have about 10-20 casinos and casino groups that have shown interest in what we’re doing, similar to what we’re doing at the Silver Sevens and the Grand, so we’re hoping to close a decent amount of those casinos this year.
Kingsley is Co-Owner of the Overwatch Team, Rogue
As Las Vegas grows in the esports scene, more and more big players are moving here. Possibly the biggest Vegas-based team right now is Team Rogue.
Kingsley: Yep, yeah so [Steve Aoki and I are] co-owners [of Team Rogue] in that and we just brought our Overwatch team over from France, we’re getting them apartments and housing and all that kind of stuff. I’ve been living in Vegas for over 20 years so I’ve always seen the convergence of esports and video games with casinos and hotels here and to my surprise actually when I start speaking with other team owners and other influencers in the esports space, they all agree that Vegas would eventually become one of the esports capitals of the world, and so yeah, now we’re kind of starting to see that, which is really exciting.
How Esports Betting Could Change Las Vegas
Esports betting is now legal in Las Vegas. Kingsley was actually the first to place a legal bet:
Kingsley: Yeah, so I actually placed the first legal esports bet at the William Hills sports book at the Downtown Grand […] I have a little picture of that.
One of the issues with growing an esports scene is that currently the revenue just doesn’t compare to that of traditional sports. However, introducing esports betting could change all of that. More money in the industry means good things, according to Kingsley.
Kingsley: I think it’s good, it’s going to be more money flowing into the space, you know, it’s the beginnings of taking esports seriously, it’s the next step just like with all the other sports. So I think it’s going to be good, I think it’s going to help bring more investments, more capital, basically just more people. So there might be some slight hiccups here and there, maybe on the integrity side of things but I think also that esports is at a place now where the players or the top tier organizations are making good money and the prize pools are large enough that we shouldn’t really run into any major issues on the betting side of things. But it will definitely be interesting, and for Leet, that was kind of our long term strategy is to focus on those things and to help out in any way we can, so yeah, we’re all excited about it.
The Future of Esports in Las Vegas
Leet definitely understands how quickly esports is growing in Las Vegas. If they can successfully get more casinos on board the esports train, Vegas could be one of the esports capitals of the world very quickly. A big thanks to Kingsley Edwards for talking with us, and also to John Alvarez for setting up the interview. We hope to see you all at the next Leet tournament!