After months of uncertainity surrounding his future, Jake “Stewie2k” Yip has announced his step back from competitive CS:GO. The EG IGL, will now be moving to Evil Geniuses’ Creator Collective and streaming Valorant.
EG’s latest CS:GO roster has been a disaster. Not only did the classic Boston-C9 core not bring in any synnergy, the stars that they kept in the team also flopped. On top of that friction between Stewie2k and Malek “maleK” Bennouioua led to the latter’s departure. And with EG signing two extra rosters as part of the Blueprint program, major changes to the main roster seemed inevitable.
And the changes have kicked off, starting right at the head of the ship. The legendary Smoke Criminal has stepped down from the roster after mass criticism of his conduct in the team. The player himself admitted that he was not cut out to be a leader in his response stream in June. Compund that with the leaked chat logs that showed Stewie2k discussing a move to streaming with Wardell, and this move isn’t as shocking as it might seem.
Nevertheless, a player as famous as Stewie, leaving CS:GO is definitely another blow to NA:CS. While he may have failed as an IGL, he was still a veteran player who could’ve been a solid piece in another team. But with over a million followers on Twitch already, he is sure to be extremely successful in his future as a Valorant Streamer.
For Evil Geniuses, Stewie2k’s departure is an inevitability that they were already preparing for. Rumors have been floating around about IGLs like Rasmus “HooXi” Nielsen and Sanjar “neaLaN” İshakov being on their radar. The team is also looking at Kévin “misutaaa” Rabier to bring in more firepower. The most important piece that they need right now, is without a doubt a solid coach. Either they need to convince maLeK to come back and give him the power he needs. Or they need to find a hidden NA coaching gem that will help them develop the future of NACS through the blueprint system.
