TORONTO — Could the day come where more people watch the video game avatars of average folks than superstar NBA athletes?

Don’t laugh. The growth of esports — defined as “a multiplayer video game played competitively for spectators, typically by professional gamers” — has been nothing short of staggering.

Millions of people love to watch these top-notch players show their stuff. Sometimes, they even fill up arenas and it’s only getting bigger — and bigger — every year.

The NBA joined forces with Take-Two Interactive, publisher of the NBA 2K video game series, to create a new league that will begin playing next February, with 17 NBA franchises, including Canada’s only representative, the Toronto Raptors, taking part in the inaugural season.

“It all started last February, when (NBA commissioner Adam Silver) and Strauss Zelnick (CEO of Take-Two) announced we were going to be doing the league, but even before that, we had been exploring the esports space, trying to figure out where we could fit into it,” Brendan Donohue said Monday.

Donohue, the managing director of the NBA 2K League, was in town to shed some light on the venture since many of a certain age don’t have much of a clue of what it is all about, or why esports is so popular.

“It’s 5-on-5. Oftentimes, people are used to seeing video games being played 1-on-1,” Donohue said. “This actually is going to be five human beings playing five other human beings, controlling every player on the virtual court. So there will be no artificial intelligence whatsoever.”

“The good thing is, several of our owners previously had and still own other teams and other titles ... So we’ve had our owners that have been passionate about esports in general, so it just made logical sense for us to make the next step. The NBA has been running a league for three quarters of a century, and then you have 2K, which is the most popular sports game amongst the major leagues, it just seemed logical for us to take a run at this.”

There is already a waiting list for Year 2, as other NBA teams look to join the party.

And why not. Last month, Palisade Research released an esports primer which read in part: “The Esports sector is forecasted to generate $1.13 billion (U.S.) in 2017, with 258 million viewers. By 2021, revenue is expected to grow to $2.70 billion, and to 438 million viewers. Some analysts peg revenues to reach as high as $3.31 billion, which would almost match the revenues of the established National Hockey League ($3.7 billion), and on the heels of the National Basketball Association ($4.8 billion).”

Donohue said he has heard those projections but right now the focus is on “just wanting to be the best possible.”

He is well aware of how the financial world feels about esports, though.

“For example, you look at something like Twitch, which has 10 million daily viewers,” Donohue said, “Goldman Sachs has looked at it and I’ve seen their reports, they predict it will be 20 million (daily viewers) by 2020. Everyone who is looking at this is predicting both viewership and revenues to continue to explode in the near future.”

Donohue knew Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment wouldn’t sit on the sidelines.

“I’ve known the folks at MLSE for a long period of time ... They are extremely innovative, they are very digitally savvy, they are a great organization and I know they are passionate about this space, so I assumed they were going to be in.”

Could the NHL follow in the NBA’s footsteps in getting into esports in a major way?

One would be foolish not to believe it will happen down the line considering the massive financial potential.

Washington Capitals owner Ted Leonsis is already heavily involved, MLSE, Madison Square Garden (New York Knicks and Rangers) and Joshua Harris (Philadelphia 76ers and New Jersey Devils), four of the 17 initial NBA participants, also own NHL franchises.

MLSE declined to comment on a potential Maple Leafs esports franchise on Monday.

NHL commissioner Gary Bettman said, while at a business summit back in March: “We envision something that would augment a fan’s affinity to his team ... because, ultimately, I could envision a league-wide competition where each club runs a competition to see who will be represented in the equivalent of our championship, but for our eSport game.”

At the time, Bettman said the NHL had been discussing the idea for over a year, “and if (NHL video game maker Electronic Arts) can continue to get some traction in developing a game that would work like that, we’ll be in that business.”

Which would be no surprise at all to Donohue. “I would expect other leagues to follow our lead and to get involved in this. I would expect that to happen, I think it’s great for esports,” he said.

“Other (professional league) games being successful just continues to grow the broader universe.”

ONLY THE BEST

The players for the new NBA 2K League will come from all over.

“Our goal, to make this the best league possible, is to find the best 85 players on the planet. They can be anywhere in the world, they can be male, they can be female, we just want the best 85 players,” league managing director Brendan Donohue told Postmedia on Monday.

Players will be paid by their respective teams.

Tryouts will start around Feb. 1, 2018, with a draft to follow in mid-March. The season will run from May 1 and go for 15 weeks, before concluding with two weeks of playoffs ending the third week of August.

When most people think esports, if they know anything about the phenomenon in the first place, they picture teenagers and people in their early-20s playing video games.

Donohue said NBA 2K players don’t really fit that description.

“We actually don’t skew that young. So, 58% of our player are actually over 25, so we skew a little older,” he said.

“I think there are some myths about our players in general. They’re actually more likely to be educated, more likely to have a higher income, there are some myths out there about esports.”

For the first season, the 17 teams will play “in a central studio, or maybe two, somewhere in North America.”

Games won’t be played in sold-out arenas just yet, but that could happen down the line.

“We’re excited to be in Toronto (long-term),” Donohue said.

“When they’ve had esports events (at the Air Canada Centre) before they’ve been very successful. We see this as a great market.”

rwolstat@postmedia.com