What caused the crisis?
The biggest failure for Evil Geniuses was the situation with the coach maLeK and Stewie2k. The conflict between the Frenchman and the Americans started almost immediately after signing. Even before that, Stewie didn't believe in the coach. At this stage, club leaders should have intervened and sorted out the situation. But despite promises, even after the transfer, no one in senior management intervened. As a result, Stewie2k was transferred to the position of streamer, and maLeK was first kicked and then made a "strategy coach".
At around the same time, EG also created the Blueprint project, signing 2 promising rosters at the time, Carpe Diem and Party Astronauts, which later became EG Black and EG White. The three rosters were supposed to participate in tournaments of different levels without the risk of burning out, while simultaneously transferring players from one roster to another in the hope of finding a championship roster. However, neither EG Black nor White formally were positioned as an academy.
What do we have a year later? The main EG roster has a laughable win percentage of around 26% over the last three months, while the secondary rosters continue to languish in North America, not improving their game against teams from other regions. Wiz and HexT were promoted from EG Black to the main roster, but it didn't give a significant boost.
The project turned out to be objectively unsuccessful. At the same time, Complexity, which had been in decline since signing Extra Salt, is feeling better. This was helped by the transfer of hallzerk. With him, the team regularly beats European teams like ENCE, MOUZ, and Fnatic. Such a level is still a dream for EG.
How did EG and North America end up in their current position?
The same year, NRG also repeatedly reached the top 3-4 of major events, including the major itself. Eventually, Evil Geniuses acquired that roster. Since then, everything has gone downhill.
Then COVID happened, teams lost the opportunity to travel to LAN events for a while and teams were locked in their regions, which did not play in North America's favor. Organizations did not try to save the sinking ship. In our recent interview, Kassad suggested creating an American academy league. ESL and FACEIT could have lent a hand to such a project.
As for EG, can their failures be related to the overall state of the pro scene in the region? No, management's responsibility is also evident here. The club is a partner of ESL and has contracts with BLAST. The organization should have been contending for titles. And before building any roster, the person responsible for decision-making in CS:GO discipline should be removed from their post. Losing a talented player like Stewie2k and the Blueprint fiasco is a big mistake and a management blunder.
The club needs someone who understands CS:GO esports in America from a business standpoint and has an idea of how to build a team. Without such a step, long-term success is impossible. Sean Gares (an analyst, coach of 100 Thieves in Valorant, and a former player of TSM, Cloud9, Complexity, and Misfits in CS:GO) suggested by Kassad, could become such a person.
Steps to get out of the crisis
The series of management failures by Evil Geniuses over the past couple of years should already be a verdict for the managers for such decision-making (or being inactive). Everything should start with changes at the top, otherwise long-term success is impossible.
Firstly, the club needs to abandon the current Blueprint format in favor of the classic separation of main team and academy and hire a coach who has worked with international teams, as Vorborg was the mentor for a fully Danish five of CPH Flames before joining EG.
Secondly, what's the point of keeping RUSH and stanislaw in a side team that is not even formally an academy if they cannot participate in the major? One doesn't need to be a genius to understand that their motivation to continue their careers will only suffer, especially at the age of 28. Two legendary players have little time left due to their age, about 3-4 years, and their resources and experience are simply wasted on Tier-3 tournaments.
Instead, they should represent the main team. Then there is a question about autimatic and Brehze. Are they geared up for further performances after a series of failures? Do they have the motivation to start almost from scratch? If both are ready, junior becomes the fifth - he has more experience in Tier-1 competitions than wiz, no matter what prospects he has.
Evil Geniuses
- stanislaw
- RUSH
- autimatic
- brehze
- junior
Given that the age of stanislaw and RUSH is gradually approaching 30, the need for replacements may become relevant soon enough. For this reason, it is necessary to start working on a truly competitive lineup "for the future" right now. All of the most promising EG players are mainly in the White roster. No matter how depressing the North American scene may be, some of the best up-and-coming players in the region are playing for EG White. It is around these players that the academy should be built.
Both the main roster and the academy team will need to be regularly sent to Europe for boot camps in order to have a better understanding of the European meta, which has been more advanced in recent years. The EG academy could participate in the WePlay Academy League as the best platform for youth teams. Perhaps the organizers will be able to soften the age requirements, as many EG White players are over 18 years old.
The most promising talent for the EG Academy is Wesley viz Harris, whose average rating is 6.7. It is around him that the youth team should be built, not including the captain.
Despite being an in-game leader, neaLaN will be a valuable addition to the main team in the future. The combination of good firepower, ideas from the Eastern European Counter-Strike school, and young age (22 years old compared to stanislaw's 28) will only strengthen EG in the future, but there is a lack of experience that prevents them from achieving results here and now. It would be logical to send Sanjar to work with rising talents, where he will have more authority.
Jonji is the main candidate for the entry fragger role. His average first kill rate (0.172) is almost equal to YEKINDAR's (0.173). If he can do just as well against European teams, then EG will no longer be a laughingstock.
In our opinion, wiz was added to the main team too early, and he could benefit from gaining experience in European tier-2 tournaments together with our proposed EG Academy lineup, which will make his professional growth as a player smoother.
20-year-old Pakistani player MoMo is the final piece of the puzzle who could become a world-class lurker and anchor.
EG Academy
- viz
- wiz
- neaLaN
- MoMo
- Jonji
If neither of the lineups works out, the next step would be to once again look at the European market after the next Major. There are plenty of young talents in Western and Eastern Europe, some of whom could be useful for EG's need for reinforcement. However, it's not advisable to delay this, especially in light of TSM's intentions to return to CS:GO. Nevertheless, we still hope that North America has not yet exhausted its potential in the discipline and will restore its glory.
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