Rethinking performance measurement in esports: How games shape coaching priorities for amateur player development.

This article examines how head coaches evaluate amateur player performance in esports, focusing on three team-based games: Valorant, PUBG Mobile (PUBGM), and League of Legends (LoL). Through expert interviews, it reveals that coaches prioritize a combination of quantitative in-game metrics and subjective assessments of mental resilience, strategic cognition, and situational awareness, which vary according to each game's unique demands. Coaches emphasize the importance of soft skills such as communication and stress management alongside technical abilities, highlighting challenges in standardizing performance measurement due to the dynamic and context-dependent nature of esports. The study underscores the need for nuanced, multidimensional evaluation frameworks that integrate both objective data and coach-driven insights to support amateur player development and career progression.