emode: "We've seen a more dominant North America"
Michael "Duck" Moriarty caught up with Evan "emode" Patrao at the ESEA MDL Season 27 Global Challenge to discuss some of the surprises of the event, and what he has been up to besides talent work of late.
How do you feel this event has gone so far?
This event has gone pretty well in my opinion. I think the only technical issue we had was one computer broke on itself, but other than that this event has been spectacular. Everybody here, the player managers, the talent managers, everybody here's doing a great job - I can't complain about anything at this tournament.
If we roll back to the relegation tournament, in terms of the results that occurred, were you expecting them to happen?
Yeah, they were pretty surprising. compLexity kept their Pro spot, alongside Professor_Chaos and Slemmy. I don't think anybody expected that to happen, but then again that's a testament to the in-game leadership of Slemmy. He's a phenomenal leader and definitely took compLexity up a notch that nobody was expecting. That would be my biggest surprise result. Everyone was expecting them with the stand-ins to be right out the door.
In terms of results in the Global Challenge, what is the most surprising result you've seen there?
I'm going to say Torqued beating Windigo. We're watching them again in a BO3. They beat them in a BO1 to move to the upper bracket final, where they fell to eUnited, which was actually a very close match. eUnited had quite the comeback to actually win that match.
Right now in the group decider, Torqued are absolutely dominating and looking phenomenal. It is just a testament to how Torqued has progressed over the past few months, qualifying for DreamHack Open Tours, ESL One Belo Horizonte. steel has really done a number with this team.
Outside of your commentary work, you still partake as a player on occasion.
Yeah, the last time I played in a tournament was a local Toronto tournament, EGLX, alongside steel, Relyks, Dallas, and our fifth was AZK. I have a good experience with the Torqued guys, I try to get involved with the community as much as I can. It just gets a little bit harder when your schedule is mainly casting.
You should see me around though, I'll be playing in MDL next season, just filling in for a team for a couple matches. But it will be good to be back in MDL, it has been about two season since I've played so I'm excited.
And that will be for FeelsUnderAgeMan?
Yeah so unfortunately that team, three or four guys on the team, aren't of age to play in MDL, so to retain the spot they need me to come in. It should be a good time, I'm excited to play in MDL again, it is always a fun league.
Looking forward to this next season of MDL, which teams do you think will top the league?
I think we are going to see a lot of action from Torqued and Swole Patrol once again. They were dominant throughout Season 27, so unless there is a complete culture change within those teams where people just start falling off or practices are taken lightly — which I don't think will happen from speaking to them. I expect those two teams to make playoffs in the 1st-3rd seeds.
You've been at this event previously, in terms of development of production and teams that attend, what is the most drastic change you've seen?
Being at an actual ESL Studio. Everybody here has a much better understanding of Counter-Strike, because we did do it in the Mixxer studio [before], which was a team that was getting involved with CS for the first time. Here, everyone has worked with the game so many times before that things go so smoothly.
About the teams, personally I'd say it is about the same caliber. This Global Challenge, however, we've seen a more dominant North America, eUnited and Torqued, who have really developed. I think last time around it was much weaker, in comparison.
emode has one final day of work left at the Global Challenge, and then will head back to Canada to prepare for his guest appearance in the upcoming season of MDL.
