Strong Baker

Owasso High School

When schools across Oklahoma embraced the eSports movement, they opened a door for students to represent their school in competition in ways never before seen. One student from Owasso High School, Strong Baker, is a co-captain and one of the students leading the way for his fellow Rams.

“Being the Valorant co-captain essentially means I’m second in command meaning me and the main team captain make most of the decisions regarding the team together and discuss our plans and thoughts for the team amongst ourselves before we tell the rest of the team. Also we have a varsity and JV team so I help the JV team practice a lot and then the main captain coaches them through some of their matches and I coached one or two of their matches also but we primarily focus on the varsity team as our JV team was able to defeat every team in their path even without help,” said Baker. “My main responsibility out of the game would be helping set up time to practice, reaching out to everyone to make sure they can play on gameday, and then in our matches I play a flexible role so that everyone else can play the role they are most comfortable on. I also make sure that the whole team has a good mentally and is feeling good, because we know firsthand hand, if you have a bad mental in game then you will make a lot of mistakes and play worse.”

Baker competes as well. His primary games are Valorant and CS2 (Counter Strike 2).

“I will be competing in both if we get passed to play in CS2 which is very similar to VALORANT so we think we can perform well there as well,” said Baker.

Being part of a team is something Baker has always wanted to experience. The eSport team gives him that opportunity.

“My favorite things about being on the team is the competitive aspect and feeling that I’ve always wanted to experience in an e-sport since I watch a lot of the pro scene and see how fun it looks to play games competitively and this lets me do that. I also really enjoy the social aspect as we all have something in common and enjoy the same things. If not for eSports, I probably wouldn’t have met most of them since we are all in different grades and I wouldn’t have even known they were into playing VALORANT.  Also being a team captain gives me a kind of leadership role that I really enjoy,” said Baker.

Recently the team competed in and won the OESL (Oklahoma Esports League) state championships. The win shows the improvements the team has made since last season.

“The championship was an in-person event with computers all lined up facing each other and both teams on separate sides so when you or your team did some good play or something you could cheer loud and give them a fist bump or something like that, which is missing from the online matches that we play for most of the season in that league. When we won that final round against Union it was one of the best feelings ever after working so hard all season and finally, it paid off. Last year in the same tournament we placed 5th place in playoffs after going undefeated in the regular season, so it felt so good to come back just one year later and see how much we have improved. Really don’t know how to describe the feeling of winning something like that but it was just amazing, and I hope to get it again next season,” said Baker.

Currently a sophomore, Baker said his plans for his future include college and more gaming.

“My plans for after high school are to hopefully go and play on a college team or get a career in computer science just not sure what exactly yet. I would love to try and also pursue content creation for Valorant or some other game but that’s pretty hard to succeed in just because of how many other people are in content creation,” said Baker.

As for the future of eSports in Oklahoma? Baker said he believes competing at the high school level will take off.

“I see eSports becoming pretty popular in Oklahoma once more people learn about eSports and get past the “but it isn’t a physical sport so it’s not a real thing” idea that a lot of people have for some reason. It will take time for sure, but I definitely think it will be larger in the future especially with it now being in a lot of schools in Oklahoma.”