League of Legends: The End of Echo Fox in the LCS
| Tags: League of Legends
| Author Alex Mcalpine
The future of who will take the Echo Fox slot in the LCS remains unknown. On August 14, Echo Fox entered into an agreement with Riot Games that has terminated their participation in the LCS. But unfortunately, the previous deal between Echo Fox and Kroenke Sports & Entertainment (KSE) has been canceled. Furthermore, KSE is getting sued by Sentinels', also known as Phoenix1, CEO Robert Moore. Moore and Sentinels have been operating the KSE Overwatch team, The Los Angeles Gladiators.
The lawsuit comes because Josh Kroenke, a KSE executive, allegedly did not honor a spoken word agreement. This agreement was between himself and Moore over the operations of KSE in esports. In the lawsuit, Moore claims to have been functioning as the CEO of KSE Esports, the KSE holding company for their esports ventures, and that he has not received compensation for operating the Gladiators.
Riot Takes the Reins
Because of these events, Riot has taken back control of the LCS spot. They intend to begin a sped-up version of the selection process they used in 2017 to pick their original franchised members. Beginning on Friday, August 16, 2019, Riot will be opening the application to potential partners.
Time does not permit the thorough investigation of each partner to the same degree as in 2017. Therefore, they will instead be focusing on select parts of the application. These include each applicant’s ownership profile, how they promote their brand, what their business plan is, and how they plan on operating their team.
They will be selecting the buyer for the slot from the pool of approved applicants from this process. Most of the proceeds from this sale will be going to Echo Fox, but some will be going to Riot to cover the costs of the selling process. This comes as very bad news for Echo Fox. They went from $30 million dollars before tax as their earnings, to having no control over the sale of their slot. Echo Fox is likely to receive even less than their original $10 million dollar investment.
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Featured image via Upcomer.
Alex graduated from UWO with a degree in journalism. He is a Battle Royale and FPS guru. He often reads 'Winner Winner Chicken Dinner' as he is ranked in the top 100 on the PUBG leaderboards. Alex is also an Overwatch and CoD expert. You can learn more about Alex via our About page.