Advisory: I have no credibility nor full knowledge of what's behind the scenes in the full spectrum scale. Yet I see so many issues that are not/ only now are being addressed at all.

CS:GO - (This will be my main focus, I plan on properly writing an essay/article about my thoughts but since I have never done anything like this and I am too ignorant to learn on my own, I am hoping for your constructive input.)

As it has been highly discussed, these bans issued to the iBuyPower players seem rather unfair. Not for what they did but because there were no countermeasures at the time of the event. And when it started getting exposed Valve took a hammer and put them down to create an example to the rest of the players, instead of properly addressing it in a collective manner, leaving them blinded for a year with no hopes of getting their careers back.

This is a two sided story as it creates controversy regarding their actions named stealing, robbing and essentially committing legal crimes. Although I cannot dispute these statements I can say that Valve had no right to ban them simply for the greater good of the future of competitive CS if not eSports as a whole. They should have been punished themselves as they did not think this could happen, or if they did they simply chose to ignore it. Valve should have contacted some sort of legal advisor to set ground rules on match fixing. Even though it is obvious it is bannable, it wasn’t stated in the rules of the tournament they were involved in.

eSports in general using the CS scene -

But enough of match-fixing scandals, on the something more productive. I have really enjoyed watching D!ngIT Weekly Cups with $200 up for grabs by tier 2-3 teams as well as Acer Predator Masters, Uprise Champions and Operation Kinguin. These are some of the events that deserve to be watched regularly by us and that should be the main focus. Instead of the exhaustive top tier teams constantly fighting in, more than too often honestly, tourneys that become less and less interesting as the amount increases. Leaving the teams with not enough time to practice as much and us getting tired and losing that special interest we had in watching our favourite team fight for that special spotlight.

With this last rather confusing paragraph, what I’m trying to get across is that there is very little exposure for the smaller teams and even the tier 2. After a decade in eSports, each major game (LoL, SC2 and CS:GO) should be able to support each team monetarily not in prizes but in sponsors. The top tier teams shouldn’t have to compete for $5000 dollars every other week to be able to generate enough revenue to have a house and food after retiring. eSports only become a feasible option when you are able to retire and either find another job on the area that you have studied for while you were doing it part-time, or if you fully committed you must have enough money to walk it off for at least a couple of years after.

Conclusion -

These issues are a rather painful thing to sort out but it would be an ideal reality. There are sponsors and investors willing to put money down for this, mainly because there are numbers to back these ideas up.

Now I realize this last bit became quite a cluster of ideas and it became rather hard to understand. Again, I’m hoping for input from you guys to help me understand the scene better and hopefully spread the word and help the players and the aspiring ones.

TL:DR

• I don’t think the iBuyPower shouldhave been banned because Valve didn’t have any rules against it at the time of the happening and they should be punished by not being allowed to do so.
  
• CS:GO pros need to be top tier in order to have CS as a main focus of income and career and need to play too many tournaments in order to have enough to retire and not have to work for some years.
  
• This issue should be addressed by having more money down by sponsors and there should be also higher pay and more room for smaller tier teams (2-3).