When siuhy was benched in MOUZ, which doesn’t feel that long ago but actually happened back in late January, the obvious two candidates to pounce on the opportunity of signing him were Liquid and G2. Well, two months down the line, one of them seems to be shaking things up at the IGL position, and it’s not the team that has 2024’s best AWPer in their arsenal, well, at least for now.
That leaves us with Liquid, and yes, it’s official. Liquid have just pulled the trigger on signing MOUZ’s former IGL siuhy and in the process, jks has been shown the bench. That move carries several implications, which we’ll unpack now.
Liquid no longer qualifies under the Asia region slot
Before this roster change came to fruition, Liquid’s lineup featured jks, an Australian, and NertZ, hailing from Israel, giving them two players from the APAC region. The rest included two Canadians and one European, creating a tie in regional representation. Because of this, Liquid found themselves slotted into both the Asian and American VRS rankings – A privilege they didn’t dislike, when they accepted the wildcard invite for BLAST Rivals 2025 Season 1. Now, with jks out and another European in, the balance has changed. Liquid now sits with two players from the Americas and two from Europe, pushing them out of the Asia ranking benefits, and resulting in a tie between Americas and Europe.
Role overlap made NAF less effective
Even without diving deep, it was clear that jks and NAF weren’t gelling well together. Both are cut from the same cloth in terms of roles, and as the saying goes, you can’t fit two swords into one sheath. This overlap threw a spanner in the works and needed addressing. I feel Liquid clung on to jks longer than they should have, and while signing NertZ may have seemed like a patch, but it wasn’t enough.
I don’t blame jks for any of that, I think you can not always look at the rating of a player and post a judgement. What he did for Liquid had the quality, but it just didn’t have the fit. And while ratings don’t give the whole picture, when the difference is too apparent, you just can’t ignore the evidence. And that has reflected for NAF, for whom things scaled down fast. His rating has gone down from 1.14 in 2014 to 0.98 this year. It’s not a good look for him or for Liquid, and his return to power is detrimental for the team’s success.
The star player – IGL conundrum
siuhy’s arrival might just be what Liquid needed. For starters, he’s marginally better at utility usage compared to Twistzz. Flash assist data backs this up, even though Twistzz throws more flashes, siuhy’s are more effective, with success rates going from 0.50 to 0.56. In top-tier Counter-Strike, these margins matter.
But that’s just one side of the coin. The real win here is how this change will unshackle Twistzz on T-sides. Among the top 10 teams, Liquid had the worst T-round win percentage, worst trade rating, and were second-worst across almost every other T-side metric. Now, when I say siuhy’s addition frees up Twistzz, I don’t mean he’ll suddenly become the entry fragger. He never was, not in FaZe, and not in Liquid either. He’s always been the player who entries off information. Or a late-round entry specialist.
But trying to do too much has watered down his impact. Becoming the IGL blurred the lines for him. He tried to call, throw utility, micromanage, and while he did okay, it was never enough. He’s someone who thrives as a secondary caller, not juggling the whole playbook. It reminds me of NiKo’s IGL stint in FaZe in late 2019 and 2020, when he tried to do everything and it only made matters worse. Star players don’t shine under that kind of weight. And giving siuhy the wheel might just change the course of Liquid’s story.
Slotting in siuhy
Liquid will be hoping siuhy can work his magic straight away, because time is not on their side. With only three events on the calendar before the Major, and being the top-ranked team in North America, they’re already seeded into the third round of the BLAST.tv Austin Major. That sounds good on paper, but it also means limited time on the server and when you’re integrating a new IGL.
PGL Bucharest might simply be there to serve as a warm up and we’ll have to see how quickly siuhy can find his feet. Often, when a new in-game leader is brought in, people overlook the adjustments needed to accommodate him as a player, not just a caller. And that, frankly, won’t be a piece of cake.
To get ahead of the curve, it arguably would’ve made more sense, strictly from a CT-side perspective to keep jks. His departure leaves a noticeable gap in anchor positions. Take Ancient, for example: both NAF and siuhy prefer the Cave position, which leaves the A-site anchor spot wide open. One of them will have to bite the bullet and adapt. Looking across other maps, it becomes clear that siuhy held several star positions in MOUZ, which could now become a point of contention within Liquid. For instance, he won’t be able to retain Connector on Mirage or A-Long on Inferno. Some degree of role compromise will be necessary.
That said, maps like Nuke and Dust2, where siuhy already plays the A-site, might offer smoother transitions. But thinking of Anubis is already giving me a breakdown. For Liquid, it’s often been their first pick. For siuhy, though, it was a permanent ban during his time on MOUZ. That’s a tough pill to swallow and could be another stumbling block in the quest for immediate synergy.
Is the move too late?
What siuhy pulled off in MOUZ can’t be overstated. In just around two months, he took a MOUZ squad that had tumbled out of the top 20, and dragged them into top-6 territory, where they stayed. He even led them to the world #1 spot, something legends like ropz, NiKo, and karrigan never managed to do in a MOUZ jersey. That’s not just good leadership. That’s legacy work.
In Liquid, we talked about how the CT side poses problems on several fronts that will keep siuhy occupied for a while. But it has always been Twistzz and ultimate stepping up to bolster the defences. For NAF, the average rating on the CT side wasn’t attractive anyway. So, maybe the change will help bring him back to speed.
But again, the time at which Liquid decided to make the change can never be put out of question. They had their shot at siuhy months ago, right when the year turned, but they blinked. Now it’s just a hopeful roll of the dice. With the clock ticking and the Major looming, there is a lot of responsibility thrust onto the young shoulders of siuhy.
