Professional play in Overwatch is still in its infancy compared to other esports, but that shouldn’t mean that its players should also act like toddlers. Toronto Esports player Matt ‘Dellor’ Vaughn, a 28-year-old Overwatch pro, was fired for a “breach of contract” involving a racist rant in a ranked game.
Unfortunately for Dellor, it seems someone was recording the match, which saw Dellor go into a racist-fueled rant, screaming the n-word for 26 uninterrupted seconds while his teammates sat in stunned silence.
Note that the volume is loud on this video, and contains the aforementioned profanity:
“Toronto Esports is an organization built on inclusivity, and we have always had a zero-tolerance policy for any forms of discrimination,” said Toronto Esports President Ryan Pallett. “Immediately upon learning of the incident, the player was interviewed, admitted to the offense, and was notified that his contract with the organization was being terminated.”
While Dellor seems apologetic in his response, it’s not exactly the most mature reasoning, either:
I fucked up and deserve to be dropped from Toronto Esports, I won’t try to argue or make an excuse, I don’t have any. I just want people to know what happened. I was having a really bad day. Didn’t get much sleep, twitch wouldn’t work for 2 hours after I woke up, and once it finally did, my internet was lagging. So I was pretty upset from the moment I woke up.
Then I get into a game against a widowmaker who is blatantly cheating. Everything was whatever, I’ve dealt with cheaters before, but when him and his entire team, and MY entire team start talking shit, it gets to me. I snapped. This isn’t the first time this has happened. I have anger problems.
The only thing I can say is that despite me using that word, I am not a racist. I was extremely upset, and I was trying to make the person I was angry with upset as well, and so I said the most offensive thing that came to mind.
I fucked up, I have no excuse. Toronto Esports is a great organization and I am sorry to them for tarnishing their name. I’ve put my entire life into gaming/esports and this has been a massive wake up call.
In our eyes, this is less wake-up call and more career sabotage. The internet never forgets, especially once recorded and in press. All it will take is a Google search of Dellor’s name for this incident to come to light for any prospective team owner – and since esports is almost all about image and being presentable to sponsors, this likely won’t do Dellor any favors in the future.
Update: It seems this was a stream highlight from Dellor’s stream, which makes it even more confusing as to why Dellor exploded with this racist rant.
