Cricket and CoD: How Ben Stokes Fell in Love with Call of Duty
The Call of Duty community has a fascinating rest of the year ahead, with not just the Black Ops 6 release coming in October, but the World Series of Warzone global finals taking place on September 14, 2024. Ahead of the event, we spoke with two Red Bull athletes, Warzone pro Jukeyz, and England Test Cricket Captain Ben Stokes to learn more about their relationship with Call of Duty, the parallels between sports and esports and more.
Ben Stokes on Discovering Esports and more
While you might think that professional athletes would be aware of the esports space, that wasn’t the case for Stokes. He was introduced to Call of Duty by fellow England Cricketer Jofra Archer in 2019, and then it became a hobby and team bonding exercise.
“It wasn't until we started getting into it a bit more that we realized that a lot of people do it as a job. I've just done some one on one stuff with Jukeyz tonight and he's just absolutely destroyed me. He's taken all my confidence away that I did have.”
- Ben Stokes
But does gaming really help professional athletes, or is it more of a distraction? For Stokes, it’s both. At home it’s a great bonding exercise for the team, but on tour they need to have full concentration.
“I've progressed from Xbox onto a gaming laptop now. And I've got a good PC set up at home, actually, thanks to Red Bull. They sorted me out a very nice one for my 30th birthday. But I try not to take my gaming stuff away with me now when I'm playing, just so I don't constantly sit in my hotel room on days off.
But when I'm at home, I play it a lot. I tend to get on for a few hours in the evening with my mates. But yeah, when I'm away, I tend to not take it away with me. So try and. You know, get myself out there and socialize as much as I can.”
Jukeyz on World Series of Warzone, CDL vs Warzone & more
One of the biggest questions in the Call of Duty community has been the Warzone vs Call of Duty League debate. Some Warzone players believe that they could join the COD League and beat the pros, while some CDL players think they could join Warzone and do the same. Here’s what Jukeyz had to say:
“I'm glad you actually asked the question. For example, would Shotzzy be able to come over and win the World Series? Maybe after a year, probably. Would Shifty be capable of going over to the multiplayer side and winning the champs? After a year, he probably could. They're both so gifted that I think it’s possible."
The World Series of Warzone kicks off on September 14th, and Jukeyz is one of the favorites to win. However, it’ll be different to last year’s event in London as he won’t have the home crowd on his side.
“That crowd in London, that was insane. I think we dropped the most kills on the day with the win after having a couple of tough games, it was nice to get that winning feeling in front of a home crowd. But, it’s a different plan in Vegas though. I'm not gonna expect them to scream when I win a game. So I'll just be trying not to pay attention to the crowd and just focus on the game with my team.
- Jukeyz
But with Warzone always bringing drama to the Call of Duty scene. Is there anyone that Jukeyz is looking forward to taking on?
“I don't care who the team is. Shifty, Hisoka, Biffle, anyone. I’m looking forward to challenging them on LAN on the same ping.”
Charlie has been a freelance esports writer since May 2020, primarily focusing on Call of Duty but has written about anything and everything! He is always getting involved and looking to learn everything about esports, but is also a massive football (soccer) fan and travels around the country to watch his home team Norwich City.