Xavier Woods is pushing for WWE to have their own esports team

On the latest episode of StarTalk Sports Edition with Neil deGrasse Tyson, Xavier Woods revealed he’s pushing for WWE to have their own esports team.

Despite being out of action and recovering from an Achilles injury, now 8-time WWE Tag Team Champion Xavier Woods is staying busy and recently was a guest on StarTalk Sports Edition with famed astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson.

The episode, which based on the discussion was filmed prior to the broadcast of WrestleMania 36 and more importantly prior to WWE‘s actions as a company on Wednesday, covered various topics from Woods’ recovery to his absurd love of mixing Cool Ranch Doritos with chocolate ice cream.

During the episode, StarTalk co-host Chuck Nice turned the conversation to Woods’ well-known love of video games and asked when he’d have his own professional gaming team. Woods replied, revealing that it’s something he hopes to do specifically with WWE.

"“So, that’s kind of in the works and it has been for a while, but the biggest thing is I really want it to be a thing that’s connected with WWE because I’m doing my best to try to be the—I’m the gaming guy of the company, and so I’m trying to shine that light to the higher-ups so they understand how important this culture and this community is. So, before I were to invest in my own, because I’m kind of investing in creating a video game right now, so money’s on hold for that stuff, but if I can convince WWE to invest in a team, then we’re gonna be all good,” said Woods."

It’s no surprise that Woods has already contemplated having his own professional esports team, but having one potentially sponsored by WWE could be a big step both for Woods and for WWE as a whole. While the timing of making that kind of investment now would feel less than ideal considering the company’s recent agenda to place profit margins over people, it’s certainly not a bad idea for WWE to try at some point in the future.

It also seems to be something the company may have already been considering as far back as November of 2019, as SEScoops noted that WWE had filed trademarks for “WWE SGL” and “Superstar Gaming League.” It could also provide an opportunity to step into a realm of gaming separate from their own WWE 2K releases, which haven’t exactly had the best year.

The monumental growth of esports and their audience is almost mind-boggling considering the industry only really started to take off in the last decade. Global esports revenues were expected to exceed $1 billion in 2020 based on projection in February.

While most projections from earlier this year are on the downturn due to the economic impact of COVID-19, many professional sports leagues that currently aren’t running live events have turned to esports and may in turn boost that projection even higher than anticipated. On top of the potential financial growth, the total global audience of esports continues to rise, with an audience of about 395 million in 2018 now projected to reach 495 million in 2020 and 646 million by 2023.

As the industry continues to become legitimized and fits into an unexpected niche in today’s world, WWE would be smart to eventually look at finding their space in esports the same way they have in other realms like with WWE Studios. Even without knowing which games a potential WWE esports team would focus on, it’s an exciting thought to one day see Xavier Woods leading his esports troops into a Dota 2 or Overwatch tournament.