witmer: "I'm not worried until finals, even though I have zero hours"
Shawn "witmer" Taylor decided to attend two LANs in a month even after his Twitlonger about his retirement. On site in Chicago, Blake "Baltybaby" Evans linked up with witmer for a quick interview.
Your break was quite short, as you were at a LAN in D.C. two weeks ago.
Yeah, we got 2nd! I don’t have any time online. I have 0 hours in the last two weeks. I love CS, I’m always going to love CS, it taught me everything, but what it takes to be a pro player the ‘show up 6 days a week at the same time’, I can’t do that. I’m more of a free flowing, love for the game, more emotional [player] as opposed to logical.
With zero hours, is that the amount of hours you practiced with the team before the event?
(Laughs) I don’t even know what mouse, mousepad, headpho — I don’t have any gear. I didn’t bring any gear.
So you're just winging it?
I've been winging it the last two years.
You're back with Jasper "sfX" Ko after that D.C. LAN. How far does this duo go back?
The first time I met Jasper was at Fragadelphia 7. I went up to the caster Boq, and asked him “Who’s that guy? I heard him talking [trash].” He said “He’s cool, just don’t hit his vape.” And I was like, I’m gonna go hit his vape.
When I did, Jasper said “I should [mess] you up right now.” So I said “Do it then!” He decided we were cool, and best friends ever since.
Especially in-game it's a good relationship?
No. We play all the same spots! He’s a fake AWPer!
Besides sfX, who would you say is your favorite duo partner?
I’ve got two. swag — we can take any site together, we can hold any site together. Right behind him is actually vice from Rogue. vice is the most underrated player in North America right now. vice is tier 1. When I say tier 1, I mean Astralis, Cloud9. I’m Mr. 5v4. If I’m JW, I need my KRIMZ. That’s a vice, that’s a Brax.
Your last LAN, you went with Hiki, EkujukE and Church. How does that compare with your new squad featuring retrQ, L0NER and zNf?
This LAN, because it’s a bigger LAN, I have a bigger spot. It scales. So because there’s better opposition, I have better teammates. But Jasper handles it all anyway regardless.
Who would you say is the biggest competition at this event?
Oh [dapr]’s team, and I’m gonna say this, I apologize to Mike. dapr never threw any matches. He’s an insane CS player, probably the best player in [MDL] right now.
I’m not worried until finals, even though I have zero hours. Technically, we should lose, that said, because I said that, we won’t.
witmer's team, The X1 Mob, advanced first seed in Group F with a 2-0-1 finish. The first wave of the playoffs is set to begin at 2PM CST later today.
