By Rachel Chiang | Assistant News Editor
Baylor has named Adam Stanley as its first esports director and coach. This move comes as Baylor strives to connect with the esports world to expand its engineering and computer science programs as part of the strategic plan.
Before accepting this position, Stanley served at Brewton-Parker College developing their esports teams. Stanley also holds a master of divinity degree from Baylor’s George W. Truett Theological Seminary.
According to Jason Cook, vice president for marketing and communications and chief marketing officer, they stumbled upon Stanley at a national esports tournament in Arlington a year ago. It was there they discovered his ties to Baylor and realized it was time to hire a full-time esports director.
“[Stanley] is so well respected, not only in terms of level of competitiveness at the school that he was at, but being about all the right things — about student development, about alignment with [the] Christian mission,” Cook said.
Having grown up in a sports oriented family, Stanley’s door into the esports world began when his best friend in high school had cystic fibrosis that prevented him from doing physical activity, so they hung out by playing video games instead.
20 years ago, the world of esports did not exist. However, that didn’t stop Stanley from becoming ranked third in the world at Halo 2 for a while. This status was the catalyst that led him to pursue gaming professionally.
Despite his aspirations, he realized that career did not pan out the way he anticipated. So instead, he turned to coaching.
“Having been involved in the sports world, I always had a really special connection with my coaches, as many athletes do,” Stanley said. “There’s a really interesting, powerful relationship between a player and a coach, and I knew that that was going to be my future someway, somehow.”
While in Waco to earn his degree, he served as a basketball coach for Live Oak Classical School and a youth pastor at both First Baptist Church and First Baptist Crawford. It was then when he realized his passion for coaching and building a relationship between his athletes as well as combining spiritual mentorship into his work.
Stanley commended Baylor’s efforts over the past three decades to foster their athletics program, and he hopes to do the same during his time here.
“Baylor has for the last probably 30 years developed a philosophy that athletics is the front porch of the institution and that if we can make the front porch look really attractive and give it resource and give it leadership, then that will show the excellence within the institution,” Stanley said. “I know that this endeavor for esports is the same philosophy. We’re going to have very competitive teams to show the excellence within Baylor itself.”
Stanley will work alongside Baylor’s OSO Esports team, offering leadership and support to the community that has already been established. This includes running training regiments, drills and scrimmages.
“What I think is most valuable about gaming is that fact, that it’s a community-driven endeavor,” Stanley said. “I think Baylor is really on the brink of having community development on multiple levels.”
As for the Waco community, he plans on offering guidance and direction for the K-12 scholastic programs on how to practice, what consoles and titles to use and answer questions educators are facing.
Stanley said when he was a gamer himself 20 years ago, he tuned out the world while gaming, which caused his mental, physical and spiritual health to suffer as a result. As a Christian, Stanley hopes to emphasize that moderation gaming is not bad, and he said it is his life’s mission to remove the stereotype that gaming is detrimental.
“In the same way that Scott Drew brings in elements of spirituality to his basketball team, that can be done on a competitive gaming level as well,” Stanley said.
Cook said by connecting with the esports world as a Christian university, it will be an opportunity to bring light to an industry many people may not know about.
Stanley will be making his way to Waco starting March 31. He said while championship banners and competitive accomplishments are great, he hopes for his Baylor legacy to be about building interpersonal relationships.
