Tfue's lawsuit against Faze has been long in coming

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Yesterday, the news was given that Tfue was suing FaZe for violating California's labor laws, particularly the Talent Agency Act, and that it was seeking to sever ties with the organization. The sports sector on the Internet quickly imploded and FaZe followed for hours around the world on Twitter.

The complaint described Tfue as an artist, not an athlete, in order to take advantage of the TAA, designed to protect Californian entertainers against gross performance contracts. He says that FaZe has essentially acted as Tfue's agent, even though the organization is not an accredited talent agency, in violation of the state labor code.

FaZe is one of the most recognizable esports brands on the market, although it is a strange organization compared to its contemporaries. Many sports organizations, such as Cloud9 or Team Liquid, focus on player preparation for competitions, but FaZe is more concerned with streaming, branding, and the culture of strong online personalities. The $ 30 million Fornite The prize pool of the World Cup is more of an afterthought.

"It's a little obscure where they make the essence of their brand awareness."

"Previously, they had a Call of Duty team and all that stuff, so they're well anchored in the realm of esports, and today their brand awareness is a bit cloudy." This is not in the news, "said Barry Lee, senior agent at Evolved Talent Agency, specializing in the treatment of professional players.

The complaint alleges that the contract between Tfue and FaZe has allowed the organization to collect up to 80% of the revenue generated by third parties and to prevent it from signing lucrative sponsorship contracts.

"Tenney signed a player contract with the Faze clan when he was only twenty (20) years old," the complaint said. "This player agreement is extremely oppressive, expensive and biased."

FaZe quickly denied the allegations. The organization said that she had only earned $ 60,000 through her partnership with Tfue and that she had not raised money on her earnings from tournament or his online escapades.

All this will move in the upcoming court proceedings and will likely lead to an agreement that will allow Tfue to break its contract with FaZe. However, the lawsuit should set new standards late for the sports industry in general. Many professional players and streamers are young, some still in high school, and for years, sports organizations have practiced on a largely unregulated basis.

Only a few professional gaming leagues have set minimum wage conditions and guaranteed benefits for players – notably League of Legends and Overwatch – while the contracts have systematically favored the financial progress of the organizations in relation to the higher interest of the players.

Here's how Ryan Morrison, CEO of Evolved Talent, described the situation as follows: Inven Global"When a non-spousal lawyer enters and examines a esports contract, he usually comments on this:" This violates the law in 19 different ways. None of this is wrong. "

The vast majority of professional players have neither the experience nor the resources to fight for better deals – but Tfue does.

"All of this has gained a lot in traction because Tfue is a big name and FaZe is a pretty big team," Lee said. "Because of that, everyone immediately looked into the eyes of this whole story.But if it was not about Joe without a nameless esports team, people would have been like "Oh, I guess that's only one more day in the hype."

He is not wrong. Last September, Denial Esports players sued the team's CEO for more than $ 35,000 in unpaid salaries and fees, although the story barely made a noise in the esports radar. Tfue, meanwhile, has seen a surge in popularity since FaZe's signing in April 2018. It has joined the ranks of the most successful streamers such as Ninja, which has earned $ 10 million in 2018 through licensing agreements. streaming and sponsoring. Ninja has 20 million subscribers on YouTube, he was on the cover of ESPN Magazineand he is not currently registered in a team. He did, however, publish a video of himself reacting to the Tfue trial just hours after the announcement of the news.

Whether people are on the side of Tfue or FaZe, the trial itself is generating conversations in both influence and sports spaces.

"What I think all this lawsuit will lead to, is that the teams will be much more cautious to comply with state laws," Lee said. "Because I think their legal advisor was not experienced in this type of law and did not know that he was violating this law."

Now that Tfue's trial is at the forefront of the esports story, leagues and organizations can no longer ignore a long-standing problem. In esports, contractual disputes are the new royal battle.

"It will be good for the players," Lee said. "I've done research on this whole issue, just to inform the teams and the winter sports leagues so that the teams change things at the league level, so that everyone gets a change all of a sudden, rather than pound us one contract at a time.Now that broke out, it gives me something easier to talk about. "

The lawsuit also generates a secular debate about whether professional players are athletes, performers or anything else. Remember the Tfue bio twitter? He says he's a "professional athlete", but his legal team seems to disagree with this description.

Tfue's lawyers could have pleaded their case before the Miller-Ayala Athlete Athletes Act, a more restrictive law than the TAA, prohibiting sports teams from acting as representatives of their players. However, the fact that Tfue's lawyers chose the "artist" pathway underscores the nebulous nature of the sport, where players are often professional competitors and online artists.

Or, in the case of Tfue, not so equal.

"The Athlete Athletes Act Miller-Ayala is more for athletes, and if you look at how the players of the Royal Battle monetized, they are sports players, but the way they win the most much of their money is their influence, "Lee said.

"It's too much money for what they do."

If Tfue's legal team had relied on the Miller-Ayala law, it would have been too easy for FaZe to come back with a breakdown of his income, which stemmed primarily from his work as an influencer and to stream. Legally, as Fortnite streamer, Tfue is an artist first, not an athlete.

"The TAA basically says that any agency contract, and all that stuff, must be approved by the California Labor Board," Lee said. "Tfue claims that FaZe has taken 80% of the money that it has earned.Technically, this can be deemed abusive.This is way too much money for what they do. "

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