I thought all of them were insanely good individually; I thought all of them were insanely good as a team; I thought they had killer coaching staff (aside from the occasional gamethrow in draft), just, all-around competency who even in their losses never dissuaded me from rooting for them.
And when I realized that basically no roster remained intact come 2020, Dignitas (the rebranded Clutch Gaming) included, it was devastating to me to be forced to reset and go. "I have nobody to root for. I have no loyalties." Because I felt a bit lost, apathetic, indifferent.
Dignitas, the old Clutch Gaming, might have only kept a single player from the Clutch Gaming roster I grew to love, keeping Huni. But in spite of only one of their four players remaining, I grew to love them just as much this year as I did last year. They have re-earned my love.
100 Thieves went from one of the teams that I was anti-rooting for last year, to a team that I am rooting for along-side Dignitas. I want them to win.
Cloud 9 was a team I rooted for a little domestically last year, but was apathetic about them internationally--yet this year I am already loving them a lot.
But today.
It occurred to me.
100 Thieves's botlaner is Cody Sun--the botlaner from Clutch Gaming.
Cloud9's support is Vulcan--the support from Clutch Gaming.
Huni, as well as presumably the majority of the staff of Dignitas, were from Clutch Gaming.
In other words.
The three teams that I am still rooting for this year.
Are all partially part of Clutch Gaming.
And I feel like it's no coincidence that a signature trait of Clutch Gaming has become the meta possibly world-wide:
The x-minute lane swap for rift herald. Last year it was ten minutes, this year due to the changes it's 8 minutes, butstill, that rotation? That rotation is something that Clutch Gaming honed to an artform, executing it pretty dang well. Even though teams knew about it, knew it was coming, knowing it was coming didn't stop them from still being able to perform it all the same.
But now, everyone is doing it. And I feel like it's because Clutch Gaming had the winning strat down, pioneers, ahead of their time, knowing where the meta of the game was headed before everyone else did. And I feel like it's thus not a surprise that the three teams that have a trace of Clutch Gaming, are all having some remarkably strong performances, albeit admittedly somewhat concerning/disappointing with their losses in the case of 100 Thieves and Dignitas.
I still have faith in them though and still want them to win.
So I guess instead of saying.
Go team Dignitas, go team Cloud9, go team 100 Thieves...I can actually still summarize all three by saying,
Go team Clutch Gaming.
Because their staff, their players, really do come in...clutch.