EPTEG releases Ho Joon “PuMa” Lee - Page 17
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Mellon
Sweden917 Posts
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Lonyo
United Kingdom3884 Posts
On March 15 2013 19:11 Protoss-Bah wrote: What about Demuslim, Machine, JYP, Suppy, iNcontrol, etc? Is their performance top notch? PuMa at least won a whole lot of tournaments for EG in the past. And to mods, this isn't a flame/troll whatever. It's just that I don't think EG is that top team as they would like to claim they are. PuMa was their strongest player in my eyes, who won lots of tournaments. It's just that EG's decision is very inconsistent as they have worse performing players on their team. They are almost certainly also paying those other players a lot less than they were paying Puma. If your "star" in terms of salary isn't earning his keep, you don't get rid of the cheap people who aren't necessarily performing, you get rid of the expensive person who isn't performing. The performance of the lower players has nothing to do with Puma. There is no inconsistency because Puma and the "others" are very different people in terms of classification. They are the lower paid general players, rather than the high paid star. You wouldn't see fans saying "get rid of other mediocre players" if Ronaldo or Messi were performing really poorly. | ||
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Psychobabas
2531 Posts
On March 15 2013 19:16 JustPassingBy wrote: Can't imagine why Puma would decline a "less salary, more traveling funds" kind of contract, that actually made alot of sense to me. Yeah and living in a nice progaming house too. Oh well. | ||
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dabom88
United States3483 Posts
On March 15 2013 19:11 Protoss-Bah wrote: What about Demuslim, Machine, JYP, Suppy, iNcontrol, etc? Is their performance top notch? PuMa at least won a whole lot of tournaments for EG in the past. And to mods, this isn't a flame/troll whatever. It's just that I don't think EG is that top team as they would like to claim they are. PuMa was their strongest player in my eyes, who won lots of tournaments. It's just that EG's decision is very inconsistent as they have worse performing players on their team. I think I'm gonna start copying and pasting now. Once again, every progamer is judged on whether they're bringing EG (or any e-sports team) more money than they're paying them. It's called Return on Investment (ROI). This return is based off EG Brand Exposure and EG Sponsorship exposure, which can be judged in numerous ways, including tournament results. They didn't think Puma was bringing in enough of a return, so they tried to negotiate a lower salary to reflect what he was bringing in for them. Puma said no, so they let him go. They didn't just kick him out for not producing results like people who post stuff like this seem to think. In terms of your post, they keep those guys around because they feel those players are bringing in more money for EG than they're paying for them, and that doesn't necessarily have to be through tournament results. They didn't expect Puma to be able to bring a return on their investment, so they offered him a lower contract to better reflect what they thought he was bringing in to them. He refused, so they had to let him go. Also, Stephano's won more money from tournaments than Puma has. So if you're judging based solely on tournament results, Stephano's their best player. | ||
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Lonyo
United Kingdom3884 Posts
On March 15 2013 19:16 JustPassingBy wrote: Can't imagine why Puma would decline a "less salary, more traveling funds" kind of contract, that actually made alot of sense to me. Maybe he wants to stay in Korea? We'll have to see what, assuming he gets one, his new team gets him doing, whether team leagues, Code A/S or foreign travel. Just because it may make sense to us, his personal preference might be Korea. | ||
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Nekovivie
United Kingdom2599 Posts
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Adashra
France7 Posts
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dabom88
United States3483 Posts
On March 15 2013 19:19 Adashra wrote: At last! Very expected. I don't understand guys who didn't expect at least a reduction in pay. Well, generally, no team gives specifics on pay, so nobody in the general public would even know if he took a reduction in pay if he chose to stay. | ||
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Jojo131
Brazil1631 Posts
On March 15 2013 19:00 Zealos wrote: But he did get to Code S. How many players manage that? If it was easy to just "cheese" through U&D why don't more foreigners manage it? You inquiry (somewhat) answers itself: "Why doesn't HuK just cheese and get code S again HUH?" " He got to Code S by getting a lucky" --MtlGuitarist97 The cheese is his "luck strat" that clearly hasn't gotten him as lucky ever since.. | ||
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GunSec
1095 Posts
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Technique
Netherlands1542 Posts
On March 15 2013 19:08 dabom88 wrote: What he's achieved in the past matters less than the results he's achieving now when negotiating a new contract, which reflect the state Puma is in in the present and what they can expect of him in future. He hasn't placed high in tournaments since March of 2012. He hasn't been producing many results in general. He can't speak English, he never streamed much, barely tweeted, was not part of any promotional team activities, and in all this time did not really make any visible effort to become better at speaking English like other fellow Koreans on foreign teams (MC, Polt, Crank, HerO, JYP, GanZi just to name a few) have. As a result, the only thing he had to offer in brand/sponsorship exposure was game and tournament results. And when he hasn't been winning important games, such as in Korea's most prestigious team league, or placing high in tournaments in the past year, he wasn't generating enough brand and sponsor exposure to justify how much they were paying him. So, and I can't believe I'm repeating this again, they offered him a lower salary to better reflect his current state and the return on the investment they expected from him over course of the new contract period. He refused, and since they expected to lose money on their investment in Puma with his current salary, they had to let him go. You are only proving my initial point... Koreans are held to a much higher standard compared to foreigners... Highly achieved Korean player starting to win less? Ok take a big cut in your paycheck or leave the team... That's all this is... It's not like anyone besides Stephano done well in EG lately and Puma most likely already makes less than most foreigners... hence why they say he's ''one of the highest paid Korean on our team''. | ||
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GuitarBizarre
United Kingdom332 Posts
On March 15 2013 19:11 Protoss-Bah wrote: What about Demuslim, Machine, JYP, Suppy, iNcontrol, etc? Is their performance top notch? PuMa at least won a whole lot of tournaments for EG in the past. And to mods, this isn't a flame/troll whatever. It's just that I don't think EG is that top team as they would like to claim they are. PuMa was their strongest player in my eyes, who won lots of tournaments. It's just that EG's decision is very inconsistent as they have worse performing players on their team. I really don't understand how people get these ideas. If you want players to be judged solely on results, how do you do it anyway? Most of the people on TL would probably say the only tournament that really, REALLY proves you're the best of the best, is Code S. Not MLG, not IPL, etc. This means that if you judge players only on their performance, players would really be best served by never going to a foreign event - trying to win Code S would be the ONLY worthwhile thing any player could do in a system whereby tournament results were the only "sell" they could make to their employers. Of the hundreds of pro and semi-pro players out there, if you want them to be judged on their performance in tournaments only, do you want them to go live in a hole in korea where they do nothing but throw themselves at the Code A qualifiers over and over, no streams no interviews no nothing, until they break into the GSL? Of course not! That'd mean a terrible situation where you never got to see any of your favourite players on teams or on streams. All the players you mention are bringing in a lot for EG. Demuslim, Machine, and iNcontroL have three of the most popular SC2 streams on twitch. JYP is still an excellent player and people follow his progress in tournaments - if as much to see if they're bearing witness to JYPvT as to see if he wins. As for Suppy, he's a personable community figure, and he's only on the team part time while he finishes his studies - Are you seriously suggesting Suppy should be held to the same standards as Jaedong and Stephano, given that EG are probably paying him a ton of nothing most of the time? (Not to mention he won CSL recently...) | ||
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ODKStevez
Ireland1225 Posts
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Itsmedudeman
United States19229 Posts
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Defacer
Canada5052 Posts
On March 15 2013 19:11 Protoss-Bah wrote: What about Demuslim, Machine, JYP, Suppy, iNcontrol, etc? Is their performance top notch? PuMa at least won a whole lot of tournaments for EG in the past. And to mods, this isn't a flame/troll whatever. It's just that I don't think EG is that top team as they would like to claim they are. PuMa was their strongest player in my eyes, who won lots of tournaments. It's just that EG's decision is very inconsistent as they have worse performing players on their team. All those guys probably make less than Puma. Of the group, JYP and DeMuslim probably are the best paid. DeMuslim is legitimately a great, underrated player, and one of their few Terrans. When you think about it, it would be weird to have a house in NA without a Terran in it. There was a time after his acquisition, before contracting Puma, that Demuslim was the best player on the team. Since then, he's proven himself to be quite a likeable and marketable personality. He was doing some really great casting during the EGMCL, and regularly draws big stream numbers. Suppy is pretty much semi-pro and living on his own as he goes to school. I'm sure his contract is smaller, more affordable, and he posts good results and draws big stream numbers that give EG good value. I think he lead his school's team to victory in a college tourney, recently. InControl has made a name for himself as a popular community figure. He participates non-stop as a guest, commentator and host on all kinds of shows, even weird ones. Even though he's not a great tournament player anymore, he gives EG and their sponsors incredible exposure. Machine, like InControl, is an original member of the EG SC2 team since 2009. His contract probably sucks compared to everyone else on the team, but he's been a loyal, low-maintenance teammate since the beginning. As long as Machine stays at a GM level and doesn't start demanding piles of money, they'll probably never get rid of him. And like others have said, I don't think it was a matter of Puma not being a good enough player to be on EG, it was more an issue of him being overpaid given his results. I think Huk's deal occurred around the same time, and I wouldn't be surprised if that contract is over-valued, too. Pure speculation below: + Show Spoiler + I'm pretty sure I read somewhere that Stephano's contract was in the $72,000 range. If Puma or Huk were making even more than that — and there were rumors of six-figure salaries circulating back then — than you can understand why EG cut Puma loose. EG realized they can get much better players for that kind of salary. | ||
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oneill12
Romania1222 Posts
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Rannasha
Netherlands2398 Posts
On March 15 2013 19:23 Technique wrote: You are only proving my initial point... Koreans are held to a much higher standard compared to foreigners... Highly achieved Korean player starting to win less? Ok take a big cut in your paycheck or leave the team... That's all this is... It's not like anyone besides Stephano done well in EG lately and Puma most likely already makes less than most foreigners... hence why they say he's ''one of the highest paid Korean on our team''. Of course Koreans are held to higher standards, the average Korean player is a lot less marketable than the average foreign player of similar skill. To expose the public to your sponsors you need to either win a lot or stream a lot and interact with fans. The EG foreigners do a very good job at making themselves and their sponsors visible. The Koreans not so much, partly due to the language barrier, partly due to the fact that Koreans tend to not show their personality as much. | ||
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dabom88
United States3483 Posts
On March 15 2013 19:23 Technique wrote: You are only proving my initial point... Koreans are held to a much higher standard compared to foreigners... Highly achieved Korean player starting to win less? Ok take a big cut in your paycheck or leave the team... That's all this is... It's not like anyone besides Stephano done well in EG lately and Puma most likely already makes less than most foreigners... hence why they say the ''highest paid Korean on our team''. They're held to the same standards as everyone else. EG is a business, as is EVERY E-sports team, and e-sports in general as a whole. And as a business, the only standard they care about is "Can this player bring us more money than we're paying them". And the primary way EG makes money is through sponsorships. And the way to bring an Return on Investment for those sponsorships is with exposure. Exposure can be achieved through numerous ways, and isn't solely dependent on tournament results. 2nd statement is wrong and more accurately would be: "Anyone on our team bringing us less money than they did when they first signed a contract and that contract's time is running out and it's time to negotiate a new contract? Ok, take a cut in your paycheck that more accurately reflects how much money we can expect for you to bring in during the period of the new contract through brand and sponsorship exposure, or leave the team." If EG thought anyone on their team was asking for more in their new contract than what they expected them to bring in, they wouldn't re-sign them. They probably do offer lower contracts during renegotiation when the old contracts run out, but you never hear about pay cuts. Players can't say how much their salary is because they've signed a non-disclosure agreement, and you wont hear teams say it because it generates lower publicity. Foreigners probably do get pay cuts if EG feels they aren't bringing a return on their investment, because that's how business works. | ||
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Fearest
854 Posts
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LimitSEA
Australia9580 Posts
With the spare money freed up by PuMa's release, I'm excited to see where they'll reallocate those funds; particularly what players they'll pick up, as they hinted towards deepening their roster. With that said, sad to see PuMa have to go, and it'll be strange to see him in non-EG colours. Best of luck to both of you. | ||
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