From record-breaking Twitch streams and music festivals to marketing deals and apparel collaborations, hip-hop and esports are joining forces. It was a simple session of Fortnite: Battle Royale, but the players were anything but normal. Hip-hop biggies Drake and Travis Scott were on esports megastar Tyler “Ninja” Blevins’ Twitch stream. Their March 2018 session broke records on the Amazon-owned platform, with more than 600,000 concurrent viewers watching. That famous stream was also the start of still bigger things for Ninja. In September, he became the first esports star featured on the cover of ESPN The Magazine and, by year’s end, he declared nearly $10 million in earnings thanks to millions of subscribers across YouTube and Twitch. If it seems like esports is turning into a regular water cooler topic at the intersection of business, tech and pop culture, that’s because it is. Boasting the fastest-growing audience in sports, esports is moving from a niche interest to an exercise of the masses. And nothing signals mainstream acceptance quite like an invasion of pop culture — and in particular hip-hop. With the emergence of megastars like Ninja, or Nike-endorsed RNG League of Legends star Jian “Uzi” Zihao, entertainers are joining investors and brands in scrambling to align with major players. | 