MakNooN leaves Team Fusion

Effective immeditately, Team Fusion is releasing Yoon “MakNooN” Ha-woon from its roster. MakNooN’s contribution to the team has been invaluable and his personality on and off the rift will be missed. His wealth of experience has been extremely valuable to the team and will continue to be drawn upon in his absence. MakNooN will be returning to Korea to spend time with his girlfriend and consider his options in professional League of Legends. He is also considering changing positions. Team Fusion wishes him the best of luck in his future endeavors.

In the coming weeks, Team Fusion will be holding tryouts for his replacement. For more information or to apply contact veyloris@teamfusion.gg

Dear Fusion Fans,

Despite the past month’s difficulties, I’ll do my best to keep this letter concise and informative. As much as I’d like to spring right into a flowery and rousing letter explaining how it’s always darkest before the dawn, I’ll eschew that in favor of a more pragmatic approach simply explaining our present situation and where our future will lead us. I hope this letter will serve to inform you of what you can expect of Fusion in the future, both from our organization and our Challenger team.

For the sake of clarity, I’ll get the obvious out of the way quickly. The team is not disbanding, nor is the organization undergoing major changes; as I’ve alluded to in the past, win or loss in the Expansion Tournament, we were planning for business as usual. The team is still together, as strong as ever. As a business, we are still maintaining a very sustainable position.

As I’ve mentioned frequently in the past, Fusion’s original goal was to qualify for the Summer Split in 2015, not the Spring Split. While we were fortunate enough to be able to make a strong push for the Spring Split, we have been by no means discouraged from pushing towards our original objective due to lack of success in the Expansion Tournament. By merit of simply being immersed in the community and giving our team and organization a chance to try and fail we’ve had new opportunities opened before us and have already learned many valuable lessons on how we can operate more successfully. The business sphere we exist in is a growing scene with few role-models or text books to reference, so every organization out there is doing their best to combine traditional business sense and their imagination to adapt to an ever-changing business landscape. Succinctly, we’re always learning. The opportunity to fail in the tournament will strengthen us for the future.

Having said all of the above, it’s unfortunate to say that it is so often with loss comes changes. The team isn’t disbanding, but the team also is not staying the same. There are roster changes that have already occurred, and will be announced imminently after the publishing of this letter. While I truly appreciated the efforts and friendships of everyone on the team for the expansion tournament, there were issues that needed addressing with our roster and player choices. With this break before the Challenger series starts up, we have a perfect opportunity for us to step back and analyze our progress. At the present moment, we are holding tryouts in order to determine the best and most comfortable fit for our team. These decisions were not made lightly, and will be explained as thoroughly as they can be while still protecting the wishes and privacy of everyone involved. I know that the community hungers for transparency and a perceived closeness to the players, but realistically we’ve reached a limit. Roster changes are always a sensitive topic, more so in such an emotionally charged time as there is after a heartbreaking loss. With that in mind, I hope the community can operate with respect towards the decisions that were made, and keep the knowledge that all the decisions were made carefully and with the best long term chances of success in mind.

Regardless of those chances, however, our future certainly seems assured and bright. I promise the fans that with this renewed time to practice and optimize our team, Fusion will put on a fantastic showing throughout the Challenger Series, with our eyes set on nothing else besides a first place finish and a slot in the summer split of the LCS. With that in mind, we have a good amount of time until then. We’ll be working non-stop to bring you guys everything we can as an organization. Before the end of January, we’ll have a store set up, from which you’ll be able to support the team and represent your love for Fusion. In addition, we’ll soon be announcing our streaming partnership choice, and from there, you’ll be able to expect consistent streaming schedule from all of the players. I won’t spend too long dwelling on the expansion tournament since it’s already so well behind us, but I have to take a moment to appreciate all of the fans that reached out to us before, during, and after the event. Professional League of Legends is such an incredible sphere for professionals to exist, due in large part to the passion of the entire community.

There truly is no business like eSports. It’s a fortunate sector in which our fans and devotees aren’t just numbers and customers, but a living and breathing part of our lives. Through Twitter, streaming, and the immeasurable ways the fans interact with us on a daily basis, you guys influence so much of what we do. From the players, myself, artists, and everyone else who works at Fusion: thank you. The support from you is what continues to drive us towards success and excellence.

Alden Haight
CEO