Esports Update: IEM: San Jose and Team SoloMid Roster Changes

Team SoloMid were the winners of the previous Intel Extreme Masters: Katowice, earlier this year. Photo courtesy of LolEsports.

The Intel Extreme Masters set off with a bang, as the 4 fan chosen teams headed to San Jose to compete in front of thousands of fans. Origen, Team Solo Mid, Unicorns of Love, LGD Gaming, Jin Air Wings and Counter Logic Gaming were present at the major, each with their eyes on the $50,000 prize and the IEM trophy.

Played on patch 5.21, with Kindred available it allowed the professionals to stay out of the currently chaotic pre-season and revert to the season 5 we know and understand pretty well now.

Lineup for IEM SanJose

Origen

• Top: Paul "sOAZ" Boyer

• Jungle: Maurice "Amazing" Stückenschneider

• Mid: Tristan "PowerOfEvil" Schrage

• AD Carry: Jesper "Niels" Svenningsen

• Support: Alfonso "mithy" Aguirre Rodriguez

Unicorns of Love

• Top: Kiss "Vizicsacsi" Tamas

• Jungle: Berk "Gilius" Demir

• Mid: Myhre "Fox" Hampus

• AD Carry: Pierre "steeelback" Medjaldi

• Support: Zdravets "Hylissang" Galabov

Counter Logic Gaming

• Top: Darshan "ZionSpartan" Upadhyaha

• Jungle: Jake "Xmithie" Puchero

• Mid: Jae-hyun "HuHi" Choi

• AD Carry: Trevor "Stixxay" Hayes

• Support: Zaqueri "Aphromoo" Black

Team SoloMid

• Top: Kevin "Hauntzer" Yarnell

• Jungle: Dennis "Svenskeren" Johnsen

• Mid: Søren "Bjergsen" Bjerg

• AD Carry: Yiliang "Doublelift" Peng

• Support: Raymond "kaSing" Tsang

LGD Gaming

• Top: Ho-jong "Flame" Lee, Cheon-ju "Acorn" Choi

• Jungle: Yongquan "TBQ" Zhu, Lisheng "xiaoxi" Wei

• Mid: Zhen "GODV" Wei

• AD Carry: Seung-bin "Imp" Gu

• Support: Bo "Pyl" Chen

Jin Air Green Wings

• Top: Jun-yeong "SoHwan" Kim, Chang-dong "TrAce" Yeo

• Jungle: Sang-hyun "Chaser" Lee, Tae-jin "Winged" Park

• Mid: Seong-hyeok "Kuzan" Lee

• AD Carry: Hyung-woo "Cpt Jack" Kang, Woo-hyung "Pilot" Na

• Support: Sun-ho "Chei" Choi, Eun-teak "Sweet" Lee

With the LCS in the off season, there was an event needed to keep fans fixated on the eports scene and IEM San Jose was a perfect event to do it. With multiple esports present including the popular CS:GO it attracted viewers in the hundreds of thousands.

The two home teams were CLG and TSM, both with major roster changes, however playing in front of a home crowd that bolstered their efforts was a welcoming change to the two teams who were recently playing in Europe.

Roster Changes on Team SoloMid

Team SoloMid had a major roster change, with three players being swapped out for new talent. New to Team SoloMid’s lineup was Kevin "Hauntzer" Yarnell, Dennis "Svenskeren" Johnsen and Raymond "kaSing" Tsang

CLG’s Doublelift switch to Team SoloMid was startling to the esports scene, was the starting AD Carry for TSM, we covered this in a previous article, Team SoloMid also had major changes, replacing Lustboy, Dyrus and Santorin with Svenskeren and kaSing and Hauntzer.

Lustboy left TSM as a result of his decision to retire from professional play. His retirement marks the end of a very storied career, having been a part of the dominant Azubu Blaze, and spending the last year of his career as a part of TSM. Lustboy has left behind very large shoes to fill for kaSing Lustboy moved to the Analyst Position and will help TSM construct their 2016 roster.

Dyrus left due to being burnt out from playing League, being a professional for five years left him tired of the game and playing poorly, in a heartfelt interview which left him and everyone else watching in tears, he apologized for failing his fans and his team members.. Dyrus moved to an apartment with ex TSM jungler, The Odd One and the two will be streamers for TSM.

Santorin left the team on good terms, leaving to stream and study on the side.

In a surprising turn of events, Businessman, Producer and Actor , Mark Cuban and the CEO of Intel Brian Krzanich are also expected to play an ARAM game with 8 professional League of Legends pros. After a decisive game, Mark Cuban stated.
 

"Look, I'm a noob. I'm still getting into it, but I love it," Cuban said during the Intel Extreme Masters. "It's like playing five-dimensional chess against the world. It's like one of the smartest games I've ever played. You've got to have dexterity. You've got to be quick. This is a real sport and people are going to figure it out real quick."
 

The billionaire has recently invested heavily into the esports scene with a upwards of a 7 Million deposit into Unikrn, an esports betting service.
 

In an interesting interaction, Mark Cuban also dropped the F-bomb. Cuban was told that his choice of words violated the rules of the tournament, and that his potty mouth was going to cost him a fine of $15,000. Asked if he wanted to withdraw the statement, Cuban responded bluntly, "fuck it," drawing himself another $15,000 fine. this was most likely in jest and the $30,000 and another $38,000 raised from donations all went into Cybersmile, a non profit organisation dedicated to combating online bullying and abuse.
 

Overall, the IEM: San Jose event is a thriller to watch, all the games and interviews can be viewed on ESL’s official youtube channel.

https://www.youtube.com/user/esltv

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