Dota 2 Drama as EG and Secret reforms with Aui_2000 rumored to join
Alright folks, I'm going to do the TLDR here and then give the history of these two teams since it will be easier to follow along.
-Evil Geniuses TI4 roster had Arteezy, EG didn't win TI4. Arteezy leaves and joins Team Secret.
-EG restructures team and brings in Aui_2000 who had been kicked from Cloud 9 to play support.
-EG wins TI5, kicks Aui_2000 off the team one week later, Arteezy leaves Secret and rejoins EG.
-Team Secret wins the Shanghai Major. 2 weeks later, Arteezy leaves EG and rejoins Team Secret, taking Universe from EG with him.
-Team Secret kicks W33 and Misery while EG's new rumored roster will be bringing back Aui_2000.
What. The. Hell. It's a messy shuffle in Dota but to the community there seems to be a common theme. If you win a big tournament and kick ass there's a high chance you'll be kicked and Arteezy will take your spot.
It's been two Majors since TI5 when Evil Geniuses secured their victory with Universe's legendary $6 Million Dollar Echo Slam. But to some fans the big jaw dropping moment was EG making the decision to drop Aui_2000 from their champion roster less than one week after winning the elusive prize.
It was an outrage of course, Aui_2000 had an extremely diverse hero pool that caused many teams to waste as many as 3 bans on his hero pools and many considered him as the key player that helped EG win TI5. EG had decided to drop Aui_2000 in favor of bringing Arteezy from Team Secret onto the EG roster. Arteezy had previously played for EG the year before for their TI4 line-up before leaving after EG's 3rd place finish and joining European powerhouse Team Secret prior to TI5. Team Secret would then get eliminated in a disappointing 8th place finish.
When Arteezy came back I was admittedly shocked considering that Arteezy had left, only to come back to replace Aui in dramatic fashion. It felt like betrayal but nonetheless EG stuck with their decision. While I can't ever agree morally with the decision, EG has still been one of the most consistent teams in the professional scene by finishing in the top 3 for the last 8 tournaments they've competed in. They still have yet to win a Major which is more or a less a mini-TI and perhaps this is the reason why the next big surprise comes up.
Team Secret led a dominating performance in the Shanghai Major with impressive plays from W33's Invoker which I would imagine was somewhat a sore reminder to Arteezy that he had just left this team. But then Team Secret pulls a shitstorm out on March 22nd, and kicks both W33 and Misery to recruit, surprise surprise, Arteezy.
To add onto this drama Team Secret also pulls EG's offlaner Universe, who was responsible for the devastating Echo Slam mentioned earlier.
Arteezy at this point has left and rejoined both EG and Secret twice and both times replacing players that the community felt should have stayed due to their performances. With a new roster for Team Secret being secured, EG now has until March 27th to replace Universe and Arteezy. Whoever was going to fill the void was speculated until a recent rumor surfaced that Aui_2000 would be rejoining the EG line-up along with BuLba by leaving their current team, Digital Chaos. At this point the rumor is almost guaranteed to be true as Digital Chaos' founder SUNSfan and manager Sajedene sent out these vague tweets earlier on the 23rd.
Complicated yes? It seems that Valve's new policy of requiring teams to lock in rosters before Majors has significantly altered the mindset of eSports as surprising shuffles like this are still occurring. It still puzzles me as to why team's would change a successful roster, but the more compelling question for me is why Arteezy seems to be the common denominator.