The Long Road to the Top of the Esports World

Esports
Written By Evan Burk

In a recent CNBC article on Team Liquid Founder and Co-CEO Victor Goossens, he outlined he long journey from online poker player to becoming the owner of one of the top franchises in the Esports industry.

Passion as a driving force in Victor's success

  • A key to Victor's success was that he was passionate about esports before it was really a business, building a website focused on the game he loved: StarCraft.

Everyone starts from the bottom

  • Team Liquid, now one of the top esports organizations, began as a website where Victor grew an audience around StarCraft, making a whopping $400/month.

It happens over a long period of time, all of a sudden

  • From 2002 - 2010, the website grew, but it was entirely voluntary hobby that Victor was simply passionate about.  He had no ambitions or thoughts of building a business out of it.

Staying ready so you don't need to get ready

  • Team Liquid was positioned perfectly to capitalize on the growing esports market by expanding beyond StarCraft and creating teams to enter into other games and leagues.

Evan Burk

Evan Burk is a speaker, former NFL coach, and podcast host who uses the sports world as his backdrop to engage audiences with thought-provoking lessons of leadership, team-building, and creating championship cultures.

Evan Burk is not your typical football coach. Despite not playing football beyond high school and no network in the coaching profession, Evan's unlikely football journey began as a 4th grade coach, where he quickly worked his way to the NFL in just 6 years, and included coaching for teams such as the Miami Dolphins, UCLA, and SMU.

After spending fifteen-plus years working with the highest-performing athletes, coaches, and teams on the planet, Coach Burk uses his unique football coaching background to teach people how to utilize the same strategies in business and life that elite players and teams use to perform at a world-class level.

Evan received his B.S. in business management from the University of Colorado, and his Master of Liberal Studies degree from Southern Methodist University. He also hosts his own weekly sports leadership podcast, The Highest Level, where he reveals how championship team cultures are built and the keys to leadership excellence at the highest level.

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