The Bi-weekly Gamer: What is a sport?

Columns February 17, 2016

I want to talk about the word “sport,” the definition behind it, and how e-sports is dismantling the stigma of gaming. This topic is a hefty one, so I will be breaking it up into two columns.

The Oxford Dictionary defines a sport as “an activity involving physical exertion and skill in which an individual or a team competes against another or others for entertainment.”

Now, the first thing that will probably come to your mind after reading that definition is, “That doesn’t have anything to do with video games! How could they ever be considered a sport?”

The Bi-weekly Gamer is a column about competitive gaming that appears in every issue of Nexus.
The Bi-weekly Gamer is a column about competitive gaming that appears in every issue of Nexus.

You would be partially right: it doesn’t have anything to do with video games. My question to you is, would you not also consider something such as hunting, fishing, or poker to be a sport? Some are on sports channels on TV, after all.

The fact of the matter is that the definition of “sport” is crumbling. Things such as chess are now considered sports. Although it might not be in the sense you might think, it is a sport according to that definition. Reading back to the first line of it, you will see that it talks about physically exerting yourself to compete. Does one not exercise their brain during chess? Chess is a game of logic, planning, and skill.

So too are many of today’s professional e-sports, such as League of Legends, Dota 2, Smite, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, and many more. A sport is not purely restricted to gym junkies or kids who grow up with a stick in their hands… or a basketball in their hands. Today, the term has come to include those that grow up using their brain to solve puzzles and to plan around their opponent while working with teammates.

Next issue I will be going over how the world of e-sports is merging into traditional sports and how big names are welcoming the growing industry with open arms.