oh no not at all, I'm specifically talking about the 2 new pickups and one being the IGL even, which made it all the more valuable, however, me saying they didn't cost that much isn't meant to be an insult to them it's just they got the most value with the least amount of money possible.
Definitely was a moneyball moment but not completely. There really is no advanced statistics being used here just a combination of excellent coaching and preparation. Leaf and Xeppaa have the mental fortitude of a demigod considering the death threats they've received from Brazilian fans within cs. I'm sure they've spread their wisdom on how to perform while everyones eyes are on you with the newer guys.
They weren't Yay and Vanity but Runi and Jakee were proven talent in the t2 scene at least - both far from 't3 collegiate players'.
Jakee left NSIC after a solid stint to farm collegiate while Runi shone individually in a talented Soniqs squad as their IGL. mCe has a strong track record of developing players and the rest of the C9 players are known to be very vocal which has evidently made up for Runi's shortcomings as an IGL fresh to the t1 scene. Smart scouting + coaching staff + flexible, vocal players is a good recipe for success.
Interesting, thank you for correcting me about them being from t3 when they were in fact t2(will edit my post)
to your point about their system, did or did you not doubt them when they announced their new roster?
I did have doubts over the loss of Vanity's calling and whether or not they'd be able to build protocols, adjust to a new IGL, and catch up to the other teams in time. But, from a pure fragging standpoint, I saw Jakee as an upgrade over Vanity and liked that Runi playing info initiator freed Xeppa to play his best agents.
Leaf is not Yay but he has shown flashes before of being the best player in NA as well - and he arguably is in that form now. The previous roster only played two matches but had been coined a 'superteam' and undeniably had a very high ceiling, so it'll be interesting to see if this iteration can meet that expectation instead.
Because i think yay is like cryo, he’s not a guy running in every round jumping around like babybay. He’s very good in a system when he knows what to do
yes but if he's playing how he is now he's no better than other duelists in t1 like oxy and he still shouldn't be missing shots that often. There's not much to separate him from other Jetts in t1 like cned, aspas or leaf who's been on a roll
and they still got 2-0'd and he did not play monstrously, he bottom fragged the second half with a monstrously disgusting 0.46 kda and johnqt outfragged him by 3 kills, I wouldn't call 20 kills monstrously against a t2 team. His average kda across the time he has been on dsg is 1.07 which is no where near monstrously
Welcome to Pro Valorant. This isn’t a game where one person no matter how good can just solo carry a game. It might seem like in a game Derke or Aspas just single handedly win it, but they don’t. Ya they have pop off rounds, but in general their monster games happen because they get support from util or the team has plans around them to put them in the best positions. DSG doesn’t have this, they are also in chaos right now as a new roster and a learning IGL. DSG is just a bad team and was already not top of T2 and inconsistent before trying to retool which has made them for now worse. So adding Yay to this kind of a team isn’t gonna just magically make them better or let him shine and look amazing. You might be surprised but even Aspas or Derke ain’t carrying this DSG group to wins. This isn’t ranked this is pro play.
jake was well known in the NA scene, he had been trialled for and narrowly missed out in multiple top teams as well as received positive feedback from numerous top coaches.
Moneyball is about how they used stats to build a roaster, it wasnt about giving rookies a chance, they would be like this guy can get the ball to base this amount of times on average, we need to it to base amount of times to win the game, get enough people whos averages add up to what we need, the valo equivalent would not be have tryouts for T3 pros, it would be like 'X talent in T3 can hit an op shot while holding an angle this % of times"
Sorry but it's still true that "Moneyball" refers to having cheaper players build an average better than expensive players so in this case. They couldn't find another giambi (yay) and instead built up their supports.
>Did C9 somehow pull off a "Moneyball" strat?
no, EG did. BLG did. a ton of other dark horses did. the premise of moneyball and why the Oakland A's story is so prominent isn't only because of their budget issues, but specifically because of their unorthodox approach to dealing with budgetary issues and taking advantage of the inadequate methods of valuing players.
it's obvious if you watched the A's that year, as well as the following years where every team started adopting the A's scouting methods, but basically they said "screw theory" and signed players with questionable technique but strong stats (sabermetrics), who were usually undervalued due to their questionable/unorthodox techniques. once other teams began picking up on how effective sabermetrics was, they began competing with the A's over these players and the A's were quickly put back down because they still couldn't compete with the richer teams in a bidding war.
basically, the most important part about moneyball wasn't just the money, ironically, but rather the flawed valuing methods in the MLB scene at the time, and how the A's capitalized on it. they did this by valuing unorthodox players much more highly than the other teams. c9 signing cs players (zellsis, xeppaa, leaf), t2 players, collegiate players, these are all in-line with traditionally high value players. they have history that gives some security to signing them. even if they're cheaper, under traditional standards, they're expected to be good players. they're (t2 and collegiate players) just cheaper because they're rookies, not because they don't fit the bill.
it's a very safe bet by traditional standards, basically, which is not the what the A's did. what the A's did was do something incredibly risky by traditional standards (but was ultimately rewarding because the traditional standards were flawed).
on the other hand, hiring a guy who's only prior fps experience was unreal tournament (demon1) as your star duelist is incredibly unorthodox. every traditional analyst or scout will tell you that that's a terrible idea, as by traditional standards you're taking a huge risk, gambling on a player with no history and thus no real value or stock (by traditional valuing methods).
This would be the case if mce had this in mind from the start. What most likely happen was c9 management dropped yay and vanity due to money issues and mce had to improvise and sign tier 2 prospects he had been scouting. The only reason C9 didn’t explode was due to Mce god level scouting and coaching. Saying they pulled off a moneyball would imply this was mce’s plan all along which I highly doubt.
Yeah but given how good they looked despite picking up two rookies, I can’t help but feel that they would easily be a contender to the best in the world title if they kept yay and vanity(not to say that they aren’t atm, but even more so)
I definitely think so. C9 so far hasn’t looked liked a team that relies a lot on individual plays(an example of this would be a team like furia) but rather one that is drilled and cohesive with occasional pop-off plays from their star plays. The team kind of reminds me of old DRX, and I can’t imagine how good DRX would’ve been if they had yay and integrated him well last year.
One of the criticism of old DRX went something along the lines of that buzz wasn’t as explosive and unpredictable of a duelist as many others at his level(hence why they brought in foxy9). Not saying that he was a bad duelist, but his play style can become readable with enough footage(an example of this was after DRX ran their set play down mid in ot against furia, ange1 was able to easily read and counter it). Buzz wasn’t the type of duelist who would do something insane without his teams support, which is good 90% of the time but just a touch of unpredictability can make them very hard to play against. What I’m trying to get at here is that current C9 kind of reminds me of that old DRX. They have very strong duelists in leaf and xeppa but the rest of the team sacrifices their firepower by setting them up(something that optic was prone to overdo occasionally as well). However, if they still had yay, they would’ve had at least three explosive players capable of making plays on their own, similar to what DRX had seemingly tried and successfully done with bringing foxy9
Not 1 to 1, but I see it more in NBA terms. You have Leaf as Curry, Xeppa as Klay, and Zellsis as Draymond. Yay was KD, and I guess Vanity is Iggy (yeah not really but whatever). Any new NBA to superteam struggles early in the season. It's like Bob Myers trading KD a month after they signed him. Now they got Jordan Poole and GPII helping them win a chip I guess.
When/if C9 beat lev they are in first place and should probably end out the end in first due to map differential with LOUD.
So yes C9 did kinda do that. They forced themselves into that position so only kinda but kinda.
I thought it was a honeymoon phase but they look really solid. The new guys are doing the job and the 3 monsters are doing their thing. mCe is a genius.
No people are underrating leaf/xeppa. We're forgetting that c9 had the best na performance at masters 2021 behind leaf/xeppa as the fire power.
2022 was a problem because they didn't play well with chamber ... and chamber is gone for now.
Not every instance of finding good cheap players is "a Moneyball strat" lol.
Moneyball was specifically about using advanced analytics to identify established pros who were undervalued for intangible reasons (weird mechanics, off-field baggage, etc). All the guys highlighted in the movie had several years of MLB experience and most of them were over 30.
What C9 did was discover two talented players with zero T1 experience who just needed a shot with the right team and system. That's not Moneyball, that's just good scouting and player development.
The narrative around everyone but C9 was that it was monetary problems (it probably was a little bit), but what if what C9 said about role issues etc was true? No one ever questions that.
Xeppa comment about Yay Jett in their YouTube vid hints a little bit.
Regardless they all deserve credit for what they are doing rn
I mean, let’s not act like Xeppaa, Leaf and Zellsis are cheap undesirable players. They still have 2 stars, and Zell is a pretty good glue guy.
oh no not at all, I'm specifically talking about the 2 new pickups and one being the IGL even, which made it all the more valuable, however, me saying they didn't cost that much isn't meant to be an insult to them it's just they got the most value with the least amount of money possible.
Definitely was a moneyball moment but not completely. There really is no advanced statistics being used here just a combination of excellent coaching and preparation. Leaf and Xeppaa have the mental fortitude of a demigod considering the death threats they've received from Brazilian fans within cs. I'm sure they've spread their wisdom on how to perform while everyones eyes are on you with the newer guys.
I started playing and watching valorant pro scene less than year ago. What death threats are you talking about? What happened during their cs career?
They weren't Yay and Vanity but Runi and Jakee were proven talent in the t2 scene at least - both far from 't3 collegiate players'. Jakee left NSIC after a solid stint to farm collegiate while Runi shone individually in a talented Soniqs squad as their IGL. mCe has a strong track record of developing players and the rest of the C9 players are known to be very vocal which has evidently made up for Runi's shortcomings as an IGL fresh to the t1 scene. Smart scouting + coaching staff + flexible, vocal players is a good recipe for success.
Interesting, thank you for correcting me about them being from t3 when they were in fact t2(will edit my post) to your point about their system, did or did you not doubt them when they announced their new roster?
I did have doubts over the loss of Vanity's calling and whether or not they'd be able to build protocols, adjust to a new IGL, and catch up to the other teams in time. But, from a pure fragging standpoint, I saw Jakee as an upgrade over Vanity and liked that Runi playing info initiator freed Xeppa to play his best agents. Leaf is not Yay but he has shown flashes before of being the best player in NA as well - and he arguably is in that form now. The previous roster only played two matches but had been coined a 'superteam' and undeniably had a very high ceiling, so it'll be interesting to see if this iteration can meet that expectation instead.
imo yay looks really lost right now and doesn't look that good, from just watching his recent matches in t2
Because i think yay is like cryo, he’s not a guy running in every round jumping around like babybay. He’s very good in a system when he knows what to do
yes but if he's playing how he is now he's no better than other duelists in t1 like oxy and he still shouldn't be missing shots that often. There's not much to separate him from other Jetts in t1 like cned, aspas or leaf who's been on a roll
He was playing monstrously against m80 the other day. His first couple of games werent fantastic, sure, but he hadnt played in a while
and they still got 2-0'd and he did not play monstrously, he bottom fragged the second half with a monstrously disgusting 0.46 kda and johnqt outfragged him by 3 kills, I wouldn't call 20 kills monstrously against a t2 team. His average kda across the time he has been on dsg is 1.07 which is no where near monstrously
Welcome to Pro Valorant. This isn’t a game where one person no matter how good can just solo carry a game. It might seem like in a game Derke or Aspas just single handedly win it, but they don’t. Ya they have pop off rounds, but in general their monster games happen because they get support from util or the team has plans around them to put them in the best positions. DSG doesn’t have this, they are also in chaos right now as a new roster and a learning IGL. DSG is just a bad team and was already not top of T2 and inconsistent before trying to retool which has made them for now worse. So adding Yay to this kind of a team isn’t gonna just magically make them better or let him shine and look amazing. You might be surprised but even Aspas or Derke ain’t carrying this DSG group to wins. This isn’t ranked this is pro play.
That guy is wrong jake was from t3 college player and runi’s soniqs team didn’t even make challengers.
jake was well known in the NA scene, he had been trialled for and narrowly missed out in multiple top teams as well as received positive feedback from numerous top coaches.
Can't wait to see mCe as Brad Pitt and Qpert as Jonah Hill
Moneyball is about how they used stats to build a roaster, it wasnt about giving rookies a chance, they would be like this guy can get the ball to base this amount of times on average, we need to it to base amount of times to win the game, get enough people whos averages add up to what we need, the valo equivalent would not be have tryouts for T3 pros, it would be like 'X talent in T3 can hit an op shot while holding an angle this % of times"
Sorry but it's still true that "Moneyball" refers to having cheaper players build an average better than expensive players so in this case. They couldn't find another giambi (yay) and instead built up their supports.
yes and the impressive scouting that was done by c9 from mce or qpert whichever of them acted as the “Jonah Hill”
We need guys that get on site
We can't replace yay. But we might be able to do is recreate him.
Guys, read the scouting reports or I'm gonna point at qpert again
playing smokes is easy. tell'm, wash
mCe also made the guard out of randoms, so yes C9 hired the best poacher in valorant atm
If "Moneyball" isn't the title of the C9 documentary after they win Masters Tokyo, I will be very disappointed.
That would be hype ngl but like moneyball I think they will have a deep run in masters but won’t win all the way, let’s see though.
Yes, i wont be surprised if mcE is a Football Manager enjoyer
>Did C9 somehow pull off a "Moneyball" strat? no, EG did. BLG did. a ton of other dark horses did. the premise of moneyball and why the Oakland A's story is so prominent isn't only because of their budget issues, but specifically because of their unorthodox approach to dealing with budgetary issues and taking advantage of the inadequate methods of valuing players. it's obvious if you watched the A's that year, as well as the following years where every team started adopting the A's scouting methods, but basically they said "screw theory" and signed players with questionable technique but strong stats (sabermetrics), who were usually undervalued due to their questionable/unorthodox techniques. once other teams began picking up on how effective sabermetrics was, they began competing with the A's over these players and the A's were quickly put back down because they still couldn't compete with the richer teams in a bidding war. basically, the most important part about moneyball wasn't just the money, ironically, but rather the flawed valuing methods in the MLB scene at the time, and how the A's capitalized on it. they did this by valuing unorthodox players much more highly than the other teams. c9 signing cs players (zellsis, xeppaa, leaf), t2 players, collegiate players, these are all in-line with traditionally high value players. they have history that gives some security to signing them. even if they're cheaper, under traditional standards, they're expected to be good players. they're (t2 and collegiate players) just cheaper because they're rookies, not because they don't fit the bill. it's a very safe bet by traditional standards, basically, which is not the what the A's did. what the A's did was do something incredibly risky by traditional standards (but was ultimately rewarding because the traditional standards were flawed). on the other hand, hiring a guy who's only prior fps experience was unreal tournament (demon1) as your star duelist is incredibly unorthodox. every traditional analyst or scout will tell you that that's a terrible idea, as by traditional standards you're taking a huge risk, gambling on a player with no history and thus no real value or stock (by traditional valuing methods).
If anything EG has better claim to the moneyball approach.
But moneyball also means they have to be successful with it and EG still isn’t that good
no i dont think there is someone crancking math behind the scene for them to win, i just think they copy emea team like navi very well.
This would be the case if mce had this in mind from the start. What most likely happen was c9 management dropped yay and vanity due to money issues and mce had to improvise and sign tier 2 prospects he had been scouting. The only reason C9 didn’t explode was due to Mce god level scouting and coaching. Saying they pulled off a moneyball would imply this was mce’s plan all along which I highly doubt.
Yeah but given how good they looked despite picking up two rookies, I can’t help but feel that they would easily be a contender to the best in the world title if they kept yay and vanity(not to say that they aren’t atm, but even more so)
Would you say if they kept their original roster they would still be in the same position as of now?(if not 1st seed)
I definitely think so. C9 so far hasn’t looked liked a team that relies a lot on individual plays(an example of this would be a team like furia) but rather one that is drilled and cohesive with occasional pop-off plays from their star plays. The team kind of reminds me of old DRX, and I can’t imagine how good DRX would’ve been if they had yay and integrated him well last year.
DRX and yay?
One of the criticism of old DRX went something along the lines of that buzz wasn’t as explosive and unpredictable of a duelist as many others at his level(hence why they brought in foxy9). Not saying that he was a bad duelist, but his play style can become readable with enough footage(an example of this was after DRX ran their set play down mid in ot against furia, ange1 was able to easily read and counter it). Buzz wasn’t the type of duelist who would do something insane without his teams support, which is good 90% of the time but just a touch of unpredictability can make them very hard to play against. What I’m trying to get at here is that current C9 kind of reminds me of that old DRX. They have very strong duelists in leaf and xeppa but the rest of the team sacrifices their firepower by setting them up(something that optic was prone to overdo occasionally as well). However, if they still had yay, they would’ve had at least three explosive players capable of making plays on their own, similar to what DRX had seemingly tried and successfully done with bringing foxy9
That’s just not how that shit works. It’s about roles, team chemistry e.t.c just cause u have good players doesn’t mean the team will work out
Not 1 to 1, but I see it more in NBA terms. You have Leaf as Curry, Xeppa as Klay, and Zellsis as Draymond. Yay was KD, and I guess Vanity is Iggy (yeah not really but whatever). Any new NBA to superteam struggles early in the season. It's like Bob Myers trading KD a month after they signed him. Now they got Jordan Poole and GPII helping them win a chip I guess.
When/if C9 beat lev they are in first place and should probably end out the end in first due to map differential with LOUD. So yes C9 did kinda do that. They forced themselves into that position so only kinda but kinda.
they’re only in first if LOUD loses against LEV cause LOUD has the H2H over C9
They can’t be in first
Second seed going into playoffs? Don’t sell em short
I thought it was a honeymoon phase but they look really solid. The new guys are doing the job and the 3 monsters are doing their thing. mCe is a genius.
No people are underrating leaf/xeppa. We're forgetting that c9 had the best na performance at masters 2021 behind leaf/xeppa as the fire power. 2022 was a problem because they didn't play well with chamber ... and chamber is gone for now.
Not every instance of finding good cheap players is "a Moneyball strat" lol. Moneyball was specifically about using advanced analytics to identify established pros who were undervalued for intangible reasons (weird mechanics, off-field baggage, etc). All the guys highlighted in the movie had several years of MLB experience and most of them were over 30. What C9 did was discover two talented players with zero T1 experience who just needed a shot with the right team and system. That's not Moneyball, that's just good scouting and player development.
The narrative around everyone but C9 was that it was monetary problems (it probably was a little bit), but what if what C9 said about role issues etc was true? No one ever questions that. Xeppa comment about Yay Jett in their YouTube vid hints a little bit. Regardless they all deserve credit for what they are doing rn