This year’s Madden series winner walked away with $250K—more than the 2025 Superbowl champions. While the Eagles players received $170K each, 25-year-old Jacob “Fancy” Worthington bagged even more after winning the videogame tournament. The prize pool for the Madden NFL 25 Championship series hit a record $1.7M, showing just how big esports have become. In fact, other competitions are also offering major payouts for gamers—the recent FC Pro Open, an online soccer tournament, awarded $532K in prizes, while last year’s Fortnite Championship Series had a massive $7.6M prize pool spread across multiple tournaments. The esports industry as a whole has also seen booming growth, with projections estimating it will reach nearly $6B by 2029, a huge jump from $1.1B in 2017. The popularity of competitive gaming is becoming impossible to ignore, as many Gen Z and Millennials take it as seriously as IRL pro sports. (Market Watch)
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