The Twitch ban of Herschel “DrDisrespect” Beahm remains a great mystery to this day. Since then, the 41-year-old has been streaming on YouTube. However, he has stated that he is open to a switch to Kick – but they apparently are not willing to pay.
What is the current situation? The streaming platform Kick aims to compete with the market leader Twitch and has been actively acquiring streamers for months. In June 2023, they managed to poach two of the biggest stars from Twitch for millions.
DrDisrespect also wanted a piece of the pie and announced that he was willing to switch for a whopping 50 million US dollars. Ed Craven, the CEO of Kick, seemed interested in the idea. He is a big fan of the Doc and announced that they are in talks with his team.
However, nothing has happened since then. A possible reason for this has now been hinted at.
“50 million is 50 million”
What happened to the deal? This was also on the mind of the streamer Big E, who brought it up in an interview with the Head of Product at Kick, Paulie Chianese. “Doc wants 50 milli and Doc doesn’t play with that number,” Chianese replied.
This suggests that the streamer is set on a sum of 50 million $ and is unlikely to deviate from that. However, Kick does not seem willing to lay that much money on the table.
DrDisrespect hinted at this in a stream in June. He said he wasn’t sure how much money they actually had. Chianese added:
I love the Doc. I’ve been watching him for years. I think he is one of the most entertaining streamers in the industry. But 50 million is 50 million.
Why don’t they want to pay that much? This can only be speculated. With DrDisrespect, Kick could definitely gain a well-known streamer. But the Doc has a problem: He was permanently banned from Twitch in 2020.
This means he has no other choice but to stream on another platform. For this reason, he already missed out when YouTube poached streamers with lucrative exclusive contracts. Thus, he is not tied to YouTube, and for Kick, there seems to be little incentive to buy him at a high price.
Furthermore, Kick seems to be pursuing a strategy not only to acquire streamers but also their viewers. They offer non-exclusive contracts which reportedly explicitly allow continuing to appear on the previous platform.
Content creators therefore start their streams as usual on Twitch and then switch to Kick after a while, hoping that more and more fans will follow them gradually. Kick might be uncertain whether the strategy works the same way on YouTube, as the platforms differ significantly.
It remains to be seen whether the Doc will eventually make the switch to the green platform. Color-wise, however, he is better placed with his distinctive look on YouTube.
Especially for content creators who frequently deal with bans, it can be tempting to land a lucrative deal with Kick before they are permanently banned from their current platform. Kick has a reputation for being a bit more lenient with the rules.
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