The Biggest Esports Scam Of 2024

Usually an organisation wouldn't qualify but this one pushed it as far as it can go.

Previous Winners

🥇 2013: Sons of Starcraft Documentary

🥇 2014: Harold Goldberg: The League of Legends Experience

🥇 2015: No Award

🥇 2016: No Award

🥇 2023: Overwatch 2

And The Winner Is…

🥇 2024: Bleed Esports

While an organization not paying out what they owe is par for the course in the broken business of esports, Bleed were quite exceptional due to scale. Not only did they bilk players, staff and freelance commentators out of hundreds of thousands of dollars they also scammed the likes of Riot Games into thinking the organization had some legitimacy. Far from it, the organization that was touted as being the biggest name in Singaporean esports wasn’t even a registered company from the end of 2023 onwards. So much for those in-depth background checks.

That lack of concern was key to how they got away with so much for so long. Bleed were essentially an organization being run like a hybrid of ponzi scheme and confidence scam. They made multiple recruitments across multiple titles even while not paying existing players on the books. The outstanding payments were largely kept secret because in the past they had turned up and the perception was the organization was vetted by partners. Being awarded a highly coveted VCT spot in Valorant certainly did a lot for their legitimacy and yet most people at Bleed had a sense that something was wrong as they chased money or accepted payments in cryptocurrency.

To give you a sense of just how much money was not being paid out the Counter-Strike division alone had an alleged amount of in excess of $300,000 unaccounted for across salaries and transfer fees. The former coach Aleksandar “Kassad” Trifunović made up as much of the financial burden as he could, even recalling on a podcast that he had to take a bag of cash to a player as they had rent payments to make. In another competitive title, namely Rainbow Six Siege, one player moved out to Singapore only to similarly be left in the lurch. Stating that the organisation owed him more than $35,000 he also said without the money from his stream he’d not be able to afford food to eat. In their Dota 2 division it was the same story, with one player publicly stating they’d gone four months without any salary manifesting.

Whatever Bleed used to be, across 2024 it was the fever dream of one man, namely Mervyn Goh En Wei. Wherever his money was coming from it was clear he no longer had an interest in it going into his esports organisation. While people went without salary he enjoyed a lavish lifestyle including an apartment in the luxury Marina One area of Singapore. Somewhere in there he was also tied to a criminal case where he and an investor allegedly attacked a woman in a nightclub. He was even supposedly inviting players out clubbing where he’d purchase thousands of dollars’ worth of drinks for players who were waiting on their salaries. (https://clips.twitch.tv/SullenFragileBulgogiOneHand-X0Q_XaQ6f0I69a9X) As more and more started to come out about the man behind the business that accrued legitimacy was lost, invites were rescinded and another name was entered into the great book of esports grifters.

It's not clear whether anyone still waiting on their money will ever see it although some have bandied together for a lawsuit. Bleed’s story shows that even in this supposed modern age of esports where we have over two decades of lessons to learn from it is still possible to get fleeced by the oldest trick in the book… A bedroom organisation bought up teams in almost every major esports title, built up a sizeable fanbase, won approval from games developers and publishers and then simply stopped paying their employees safe in the knowledge it’d take a while for anyone to take the risk to publicly say anything about it. Sam Bankman-Fried was probably a fan.