Esports, short for electronic sports, is a form of competition using video games. Esports often takes the form of organized, multiplayer video game competitions, particularly between professional players, individually or as teams.
Manuel Schenkhuizen, better known as Grubby, is a Dutch real-time strategy gamer and former professional esports player. He competed in the RTS games Warcraft III (WC3), Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne and Starcraft II. Grubby is the most successful WC3 player of all time, as an Orc player, having won more than 38 LAN tournaments, of which six were World Championships. His command over the Horde placed him early enough among the elite of the WC3 players, while his clash with Jang "Spirit Moon" Jae-ho rewarded him with a legendary status among the fans of the game. Grubby has been known for being part of one of the most successful WC3 teams in history, namely the British 4Kings. Later teams include the Danish MeetYourMakers and the North American Evil Geniuses. Grubby is widely regarded as one of the greatest Orc players of all time. Grubby is now a popular full-time streamer on Twitch.
Major League Gaming Corp. (MLG) is a professional esports organization. MLG is headquartered in New York City, New York and was founded in 2002 by Sundance DiGiovanni and Mike Sepso. MLG has held official video game tournaments throughout the United States and Canada. The Boost Mobile MLG Pro Circuit was a television broadcast of Halo 2 MLG tournaments in 2006 and 2007, ESPN.com, and other broadband sites. The company has also been involved in television production, and game development. MLG's aim is to elevate computer and console game tournaments to viable competitive and spectator events.
Matt Leto, known by the gamer tag Zyos, is a former American professional player of the first-person shooter video games Halo: Combat Evolved and Halo 2. Zyos spent a year in his late teens accumulating video game records, and for a while was the holder of the most records. After dropping out of DigiPen Institute of Technology, Leto pursued a career in professional gaming.
Tom Taylor, known by the gamertag Tsquared, is a former professional gamer and captain of one of the most successful teams in Major League Gaming (MLG) history, Str8 Rippin, and was also the coach of Status Quo during the 2010 National Championships in Dallas where he helped them place 2nd behind Final Boss. Making him one of the only players to also coach an event. He was signed to a US$250,000 contract by MLG and earned between $120,000 and $150,000 each year in prize money and endorsement deals. He has founded his own company, Gaming Lessons, which tutors prospective professional gamers on various video games, specifically on the Halo series. Several other professional gamers from MLG are also employed by Gaming Lessons as instructors. He also runs an active YouTube channel with over 10,000 subscribers and 24 hours' worth of content.
David Walsh is a retired American professional esports player. His professional career in gaming began in 2004 under the name Walshy. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest and most successful Halo players of all time.
Ryan Danford is an American former professional Halo player known by the handle Saiyan. He was influential in the early days of professional video gaming or esports and played for the champion teams Shoot to Kill, Team 3D, and Final Boss: In 2006, Major League Gaming stated, "One of the true veterans of the league, Saiyan has been a force in Major League Gaming's upper echelon since its onset." Saiyan retired from professional gaming in 2007.
Eric Hewitt, also by his tag GH057ayame (Ghostayame), is a retired professional Major League Gaming (MLG) gamer. He now works for 343 Industries working on future Halo games.
Ben Jackson, also known by his pseudonym Karma, is a former professional Halo player from Murrieta, California, United States. He attended Murrieta Valley High School. He started playing Halo intensively when Halo 2 was announced and widespread promotion of the Xbox 360 commenced.
Tom Ryan, known under the pseudonym Ogre 2, is a retired professional Halo player from Columbus, Ohio. He is widely considered to be the greatest Halo player of all time. He and his twin brother Dan are known as the "Ogre Twins". In 2005, the Ogre Twins won the gold medal in Halo 2 at the World Cyber Games. His esports tournament history includes in Halo: Combat Evolved, Halo 2, Shadowrun, Halo 3, Halo: Reach, Halo 4, Halo 5: Guardians, Halo 2: Anniversary, and Call of Duty: Ghosts.
Matthew Haag, better known as Nadeshot, is an American former professional Call of Duty player, and founder, co-owner and CEO of 100 Thieves. As a professional Call of Duty player, Haag was a former captain of OpTic Gaming in the 2014 Call of Duty: Ghosts season and the 2014–2015 Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare season, playing the objective support role.
Final Boss was a professional esports team that competed in Halo competitions sponsored by Major League Gaming (MLG) and other tournaments. With its most successful lineups consisting of a core of Dan "Ogre 1" Ryan, Tom "Ogre 2" Ryan and Dave "Walshy" Walsh, Final Boss is regarded as one of the best Halo teams of all time due to their numerous tournament victories and MLG National Championships from 2004 to 2010. They also hold the record for the longest consecutive event winning streak, with 8 straight tournament victories from 2005 into 2006.
OpTic Gaming is an American professional esports and entertainment organization headquartered in Frisco, Texas. The organization currently operates a Call of Duty team in the Call of Duty League, OpTic Texas, they also operate a Overwatch team in the Overwatch League, Dallas Fuel, as well as Rocket League, Halo and Apex Legends teams. They previously competed in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Gears of War 4, PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, Fortnite Battle Royale, Dota 2, League of Legends and Valorant. The organization is currently owned by Hector "H3CZ" Rodriguez and Mike “Hastr0” Rufail.
Str8 Rippin is a professional Halo team in the United States that competes in the Halo Championship Series. Str8 Rippin was first formed in 2005 for Halo 2 on the Major League Gaming (MLG) Pro Circuit. Their most successful period was during the MLG Halo 3 Pro Circuit, when they won several tournaments. Tom "Tsquared" Taylor was their longtime captain and was considered the face of the team for several years.
Boost Mobile MLG Pro Circuit is a television program on US cable television network USA, and later G4, airing recordings of the Major League Gaming (MLG) Halo 2 Pro Circuit in 2006 and 2007. It was sponsored by Boost Mobile and Scion. Boost subscribers had access to exclusive videos such as match highlights and player profiles. The production company was Red Brick Entertainment.
Team Envy was an American esports franchise based in Dallas, Texas, owned by Envy Gaming. Founded in 2007 as a professional Call of Duty team under the moniker Team EnVyUs, they fielded rosters in Counter-Strike, FIFA, Fortnite, Gears of War, Halo, League of Legends, Chess, Magic: the Gathering, Overwatch, Paladins, PUBG, Rocket League, SMITE, StarCraft, Super Smash Bros., Street Fighter and Valorant. Following the merger between Envy Gaming and OpTic Gaming, Envy Gaming retired the Team Envy brand in June 2022, shifting all of them to the OpTic Gaming moniker.
Splyce (SPY) was a professional esports organization and media company based in Rochester, New York. Their League of Legends team was a franchise member of the LEC, Europe's top professional league for League of Legends. Splyce announced its rebranding from Follow eSports in November 2015. On November 29, 2019, Splyce's parent company, OverActive Media, announced it had merged Splyce with its other esports subsidiary, MAD Lions, and that all of Splyce's teams would henceforth compete under that name.
Seth Abner, also known as scump, scumperjumper or The King of COD is a former American professional Call of Duty player who last played for the Call of Duty League team OpTic Texas. Abner is a two time Major League Gaming (MLG) X Games gold medalist. During the first ever Esports Awards in 2016, Scump won the Esports Console Player of the Year award. In August 2017, Scump achieved his first ever Call of Duty World Championship. Abner is sponsored by several gaming hardware companies, including Turtle Beach and Scuf Gaming. As of December 15, 2018, Scump has more than $600,000 from tournament winnings, of which $261,250 was won in Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare. He also runs a YouTube channel that currently has obtained over 2.6 million subscribers and over 590 million channel views as of January 24, 2021. He is widely considered to be one of the greatest Call of Duty players of all time.
Michael Sepso is an American video game, media and technology entrepreneur and currently co-founder and CEO of Vindex, a gaming and esports technology infrastructure business. He is the co-founder of Major League Gaming, a professional esports league and media company acquired by video game publisher Activision Blizzard in December 2015
