Aaron Zheng becomes sponsored Pokémon player

[Joshawott]

Source

Corporate sponsorship in sports is about as much news as it is that the sun rises in the morning; you can’t watch a match of just about any sport without your eyes being bombarded with advertisements for every kind of product you can think of. This isn’t even just at a national level; local village kids league teams also sport sponsorship logos on their team shirts.

Pokémon however, is nowhere near the heights of popularity or exposure that the likes of football is in the United Kingdom or baseball is in the United States. It is, like many “eSports” however, growing. In the past few years, The Pokémon Company International have started to hold official tournaments in countries reaching the far corners of the globe, including Japan, North America, the United Kingdom and Australia among many others. Last year’s Pokémon Video Game World Champions were streamed via the streaming service twitch.tv and today, The Pokémon Company International announced that this year’s U.S. Nationals would be the first of that level to be broadcast worldwide as well and the number of players is only increasing.

Where could this be going in the future though? The two time Pokémon U.S. National Champion Aaron “Cybertron” Zheng revealed on Twitter today that he has now officially joined Clash Tournaments‘ competitive team, making him a “professional” player of Game Freak’s animal collecting and battling franchise.

Could this be the future of Pokémon competitive battling? What do you make of this development? When will someone sponsor me to play Pokémon?!

What do you guys make of this? To be honest, I'm really mixed about what this could mean for the future of the competitive scene and such.

 

[Left_4_TF2]

Re: Aaron Zheng becomes first sponsored Pokémon player

Well, I for one extend my congratulations to Aaron, because he really worked hard and smart for it.

 

[UB-01 Kenobi]

Re: Aaron Zheng becomes first sponsored Pokémon player

Well if League of Legends is a "sport" these days we deserve it too, Pokémon has been around longer and is a much better game IMO and follows better in the footsteps of the first not-sport sport, chess.

 

[Left_4_TF2]

Re: Aaron Zheng becomes first sponsored Pokémon player

I could say the same for Team Fortress 2, but you know it looks like players of the game itself already get sponsorships up the ante. And don't get me started on Starcraft.

 

[TerraTF]

Re: Aaron Zheng becomes first sponsored Pokémon player

I'm gonna clarify this real quick. Aaron "Cybertron" Zheng was sponsored for VGC, not Battle Spot singles in case anyone becomes confused.

But onto the good stuff.

Fucking Cybertron though. He's a great player. Very knowledgeable and an extremely kind person.

 

[Joshawott]

Re: Aaron Zheng becomes first sponsored Pokémon player

I'm gonna clarify this real quick. Aaron "Cybertron" Zheng was sponsored for VGC, not Battle Spot singles in case anyone becomes confused.

I'm not sure anyone doubted otherwise. How would you even be sponsored for Battle Spot anyway? "Oh er...make your personal message to buy our stuff"? xD

 

[Left_4_TF2]

Re: Aaron Zheng becomes first sponsored Pokémon player

I'm gonna clarify this real quick. Aaron "Cybertron" Zheng was sponsored for VGC, not Battle Spot singles in case anyone becomes confused.

I'm not sure anyone doubted otherwise. How would you even be sponsored for Battle Spot anyway? "Oh er...make your personal message to buy our stuff"? xD

Also at the moment, VGC is pretty much the only battle format sponsored officially by Nintendo.

 

[TerraTF]

Re: Aaron Zheng becomes first sponsored Pokémon player

I'm gonna clarify this real quick. Aaron "Cybertron" Zheng was sponsored for VGC, not Battle Spot singles in case anyone becomes confused.

I'm not sure anyone doubted otherwise. How would you even be sponsored for Battle Spot anyway? "Oh er...make your personal message to buy our stuff"? xD

How do you get sponsored for VGC?

This is untreaded waters for Competitive Pokemon so far.

 

[GuitarHero]

It can only mean good things for the competitive Pokemon VG scene really. Hopefully this sparks more interest for other pro gaming teams to start recruiting "pro" Pokemon players, it would certainly help competitive battling be brought into the gaming spotlight a bit more than it is now.

 

[Muur]

Never heard of him

People to copy him like with Hoban in YGO

 

[sharkshocker]

That's a good step to Pokemon getting more exposure, congratulations to being a pioneer in that. I'm kinda mixed about it though because it's hard to say how this will affect the meta, as it's a balance between highlighting professional players while keeping creativity in how people play.

 

[Alexey]

Now I wonder...
Where's my Gazprom sponsorship?

 

[DCM]

this is really great news. I wonder if more players are going to be sponsored

 

[Solayoh]

I'm glad for Pokemon in general, it would be a dream to get paid to play Pokemon, but I just lack the brain power to do all that strategising and 2nd guessing.

Wouldn't mind doing a lets play and getting money off the ad revenue for it, dunno how I'd distinguish myself from the others tho.

 

[Aestivate]

Personally I think it's really great and I can't think of another player more deserving. Cybetron is a fellow NYC native and seems to be super classy in addition to being really freaking good at VGC. He's really young but really mature and poised and I'm really looking forward to seeing what this means for the future of Pokemon VGC.