kkOma: “Players are not machines. They’re human beings, but because we win all the time, our fans have higher and higher expectations every year."
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The Bird's Nest fills up this weekend as defending World Champion SK telecom T1 takes on Samsung Galaxy in a rematch of last year's Finals. One team chases their standard and the other looks to start their own.
A crinkled LED "SK telecom T1 Fighting" banner laid on the floor and fluttered in Shanghai. The fifty-plus crowd of fans it came from had largely dissipated by then. They'd congregated at the entrance to the player hotel hoping to catch even a glimpse. In a small corner just beyond that fallen sign was where SK telecom T1 coach Jeonggyun "kkOma" Kim liked to take his smoke breaks.
After a certain result earlier in the tournament, kkOma walked into our player management room and fist pumped the air. He was ecstatic. You will at times find him in the lobby bar or at our after parties. He may as well be an employee with how long he sticks around at international events. And finding him outside is, at this point, as routine as victory for the most dominant organization in the history of League of Legends esports.
SK telecom T1 isn't just making history — at this point, they are history. Since the advent of the League Championship Series in North America and Europe, SKT has won three out of four World Championships and now are on the cusp of securing their fourth. kkOma has been at the SKT helm for all of them.
Players are not machines. They're human beings, but because we win all the time, our fans have higher and higher expectations every year.
kkOma is a jittery man. Not in a hectic manner, but he is a restless and animated speaker. It is almost odd for me to see him up close in a suit (I don't interact much with him on game days) — he otherwise wears hoodies and sweatpants. We are in a teahouse in Beijing and Samsung Galaxy is seated on the other side of the room. This is something SKT has a lot of experience with at this point. After I first finish my chat with him, he doubles back within seconds and taps my shoulder.
I'm only happy when we actually win Worlds, and even then, I'm only a little bit happy.
"There is one thing I really wanted to add," he says. He sits back down. He wants to add to his response on some fans being sick of SKT winning and how some of them just want to see SKT lose. "Players are not machines," he says."They're human beings, but because we win all the time, our fans have higher and higher expectations every year. At this Worlds, we make the comebacks. We go up to the fifth game, and we win 3-2. This is the result of our efforts and practices."
I don't think anyone would say SKT doesn't deserve their titles. Far from it. But there is something unnerving about a three-time champion believing they still have a chip on their shoulder. For the rest of the world, SKT is as close to perfect as it gets. What SKT is chasing, though — having already reached the top of the mountain — is the idea that they are immortal.
It feels almost dirty to call Samsung Galaxy the underdog. They had an absolutely dominant run through the Knockout Stage in besting Longzhu Gaming and Team WE. Both were considered the strongest team from their respective regions coming into Worlds by many analysts. And yet here we are. Last year's runner-up finds themselves staring at the same wall they couldn't scale. The hope, then, is two-fold. Firstly, they'll hope they developed enough over the last year (having retained their roster) to finally climb that wall. And secondly — and perhaps most importantly — they'll hope that wall didn't grow.
"I think it is natural to look at SKT [and think]," says jungler Chanyong "Ambition" Kang, "And I can't be sure of this, but there must be a lot of stress in defending a championship."
Ambition is the man responsible for leading Samsung's charge. Just in the past year, he has stepped aside for a younger jungler only to be re-summoned because his presence on the team was too valuable.
"I'm not a super mechanical player or the type of guy that can turn a lost fight into a won fight," he says. "However, I don't waste time and I know how to win the game. I'm not saying I'm always right (or we'd have won every game), but I try to give my teammates direction so there's a low chance of derailing."
To me, that summarizes Samsung's style in a nutshell. It isn't overly flashy. It's more like watching a boa constrictor strangle something to death. Like how we watched as they siphoned the life out of Team WE in the Semifinals. They're an incredibly deadly team once they secure a lead, and given the trend of the tournament thus far, they are likely to secure early leads over SKT. It's a matchup that is in favor of Samsung on paper, and every analytical bone in my body says Samsung is in good shape here.
But I have learned to not bet against SKT over the years. They have survived this entire tournament even when the situation was stacked against them. It doesn't help that Samsung hasn't managed to win anything in their tenure together as a team. They may be lacking the proverbial killer instinct. But every other team in the world would have a historic year by just reaching one Worlds Finals, let alone back-to-back. It's not enough to just get there, though. Not for Samsung.
"I thought about [Worlds 2016 Finals Game 5] a lot," says Sungjin "CuVee" Lee. He is immediately one of the most personable players. You may already have a hint of that from his action poses on air — one of them involves him folding his arms into a heart over his head. And when he talks, his head bobs up and down — just a little — as if developing a cadence.
"Ever since I was preparing to come to Worlds this year," he continues, "I really wanted to advance to the Finals like we did last year. I thought about what we did well [then] and what we did poorly [then]."
It was the kind of game that haunts a player. It's one thing to get swept 3-0. That just means you were mismatched or you failed to show up at all. But to be one game off from reverse sweeping SK telecom T1? That's different. Instead of remembering an ocean between you and your opponent, you start to remember a stone here or a stone there that could have helped you cross the river.
I think it is natural to look at SKT [and think] there must be a lot of stress in defending a championship.
In the last year, CuVee has developed into one of the most consistent forces in the LCK and has elevated his name into contention for being the best top laner in the World. He has backed that reputation at Worlds by serving as the backbone for Samsung.
He has kept a level head, though. "I always try not to be swept away by those opinions or praises," he says. "I try to always control my mind because I don't think I'm the best top laner in the world. I am still in the process of becoming one."
What's on the line for Samsung is simple. Either win or become another checkmark on the SKT calendar. Where SKT is striving to build upon their legacy, Samsung is trying to thwart it. They, too, can build their own legend — a win would be the organization's second in four years, which matches SKT's mark over that same time period. It would serve as a signal that SKT doesn't hold a monopoly on the World Championship.
For the players, though, it may be even simpler. Even if CuVee's reason is a little selfish. Whenever he struggles, he asks himself, "What can I do if I had to leave this team and League of Legends?" His response is honest. He says, "There's really nothing much I can do. So I just want to stay here and do whatever I can and have a really comfortable life after that."
On the contrary, Ambition got married earlier this year. How long he can continue to gaming grind remains to be seen — because he needs to stay with the team, he is only able to see his wife during the holidays. But he says she has provided him with renewed motivation and reason to play the game. [Because of her], he adds, "I think I found the answer as to why I have to play this game."
"While SSG may not be our biggest rival, they are still one of the big ones because we've had a lot of matchups against them," says SKT ADC Bang. "Sometimes we won, sometimes we lost. SSG is not a team we should look down on and we should always stay on our toes against them."
I found Bang's response telling. I don't necessarily disagree with him — it's hard not to look at KT Rolster as SKT's biggest rival. But facing the same opponent on the biggest possible stage two years in a row has to count for something, right? Bang went on to say SKT considered all their opponents rivals because this was such a close-fought World Championship. I don't necessarily disagree with that either, but to me it seems it's more that nobody has managed to stick out.
For a long time now, SKT has found their biggest rival in the mirror. They are not overly wary of what other teams are doing. Each and every one of their players will tell you they are only focused on what they did right or wrong and how they can improve their own play. Where every other team is playing PvP, SKT have seemingly taken a PvE approach. They've built themselves to be able to handle anything that is thrown their way.
But cracks are now showing. Bang buried his head in his hands in the set against Royal Never Give Up when they found themselves in a hole. None of SKT ever feel like they're actually going to be eliminated — instead they think about what they can do to get out of the hole. It's always, "What's next?" instead of "What happened?"
"I never felt we could get eliminated by any other team," he says. Not once.
kkOma echoed the sentiment and said other teams become impatient when they go up 2-1, for example, against SKT. The pressure isn't on SKT. It's on the other team to close out. Though he admits the only times he takes a smoke break during sets is if his team drops down to 1-2. But, he says, "When I come back, I think about how I should do the draft phase for the fifth game."
There is supreme confidence in both of their answers. You might call it hubris, but it is hard to argue against results. The reason Bang's head was down, though, is tied to that chip they carry on their shoulder. It seems the greats in every sport are always striving to prove someone or something wrong. For example, Michael Jordan famously held grudges all the way to his Hall of Fame induction ceremony.
And specifically for Bang, he says, "This year was the first time I ever expressed my emotions that much because I really wanted to win that series [against RNG]." For once Bang found himself swept up by the tide of the game. Suddenly he was tripping over what had happened instead of focusing on what was to come.
He continues, "[I cared because] I know many people have been saying SKT have been struggling for the last three or four months, but when I look back at the results, I don't think we have been struggling that bad. However, people still criticize us a lot, and our only way to prove that's not true is by winning. Even small mistakes are criticized a lot, so I want to win to prove it's not true [that we are struggling]."
This, to me, was fascinating. I do think a lot of people have said SKT look weak or that they are struggling. I am one of those people. But that's only if you contextualize it as SKT. For most teams, what SKT has accomplished in the last few months would be nothing short of remarkable.
This is what the pursuit of perfection actually looks like. As onlookers, anything short of perfection is another mark against SKT. Even something like criticizing their early game struggles is maybe not looking properly at the picture. If SKT is picking champions for late game, then it should make sense that they would struggle in the early game. And, perhaps, it should make some sense that they bounce back in the late game.
But not to the extremes we've seen it. I still think SKT struggled against MSF and against RNG. I don't think you can call a 3-2 set anything but a struggle. But I also think Bang's bigger point is simple — what difference does a 3-2 set make versus a 3-0 set? At the end of the day, the 3 advances. And nobody is more successful at that then SK telecom T1.
"I know many people were thinking, ‘SKT is gonna lose,' but they [thought that] last year as well," says Bang. He is quick to always credit the SKT preparation. It's not about showing up or being flashy or some inexplicable magic. Not to him. They just know how to balance their ups and downs, and their preparation is meticulous.
kkOma, for example, doesn't care about winning or losing once a game starts. He only focuses on the weaknesses of the team and how he can fix them. It is, to me, a harmonious balance. The players look forward as the coach cleans up the mess behind them.
I ask him if he found any relief in his team managing to pull through. He says, "I'm only happy when we actually win Worlds, and even then, I'm only a little bit happy."
The long grind of the years have taken their toll on kkOma. "When it comes to stress, actually, I have nothing to relieve my stress ever since I started working here," he laughs. "A lot of fans can tell I lost hair and got really old. [Smoking] does not help me relieve stress, but I can be alone when I smoke, so… I think I just do it out of habit."
It is, as I said earlier, just part of his routine.
makes the call
does the play
