Do Evil Geniuses really deserve to be an ESL and BLAST partner team?
The North American squad is a stable competitor at some of the biggest tournaments in CS:GO - but not because of their results or level of CS.
Evil Geniuses is a huge quantity in professional Counter-Strike with the North American team having several top-tier titles in their trophy cabinet where the victories at StarSeries & i-League Season 8 and ESL One: New York in 2019 are the two most prestigious.
Partner agreements
However, in recent times, it seems like Evil Geniuses’ only justification for existing in top-tier CS:GO is their partner spots in BLAST and ESL – the two biggest tournament organizers in the game.
Because if you’re lucky enough to be among the partnered teams with ESL and BLAST it means that you’re directly invited to a majority of their tournaments – and therefore also a large portion of the top-tier events in the calendar.
That includes events such as ESL Pro League and BLAST Premier Spring Group/Fall Groups.
But what have Evil Geniuses got out of their partner spots?
When looking at their ten latest results at top-tier events held by ESL and BLAST, it quickly shows a clear pattern; EG bumping out of the tournaments really early – in fact they’ve finished last seven out of ten times, and second to last two times.
Something that could imply that they simply don't belong together with the likes of NAVI, FaZe and G2.
Here it's worth mentioning that strong teams such as Cloud9, Spirit, and Outsiders/Virtus.pro don't hold any partner spots. Although that could be due to various reasons outside of the game itself.
Evil Geniuses in S-tier event held by ESL and BLAST:
(Last ten events)
- IEM Katowice (#21-24th) - last place | ESL ranking
- BLAST Premier Spring Groups (#10-12th) - last place | Invited as a partner team
- IEM Rio Major (#20-22nd) - second to last | Qualified through NA RMR
- ESL Pro League Season 16 (#13-16th) | Invited as a partner team
- BLAST Premier Fall Groups (10-12th) - last place | Invited as a partner team
- ESL Pro League Season 15 (#21-24th) - last place | Invited as a partner team
- BLAST Premier Spring Groups (#10-12th) - last place | Invited as a partner team
- BLAST Premier Fall Groups 2021 (#10-12th) - last place | Invited as a partner team
- ESL Pro League Season 14 – (#21-24th) - last place | Invited as a partner team
- IEM Cologne (#17-20th) - second to last | Road to Cologne NA ranking
In danger of losing important ESL Pro League spot
Evil Geniuses could in fact lose their spot in ESL Pro League in the future despite them being a partner team. That's due to them finishing last three out of four times and a certain rule in the Louvre Agreement.
“Partner Teams have a permanent slot in Pro League every season. The permanent slot shall be subject to review if Partner Team places last in their group in 3 out of 4 seasons", according to § 1, rule number III.
ESL partner teams:
Astralis – BIG – Complexity – ENCE – Evil Geniuses – FaZe – Fnatic – FURIA – G2 – Heroic – MOUZ – NAVI – NIP – Liquid – Vitality
BLAST partner teams
Astralis – BIG – Complexity – Evil Geniuses – FaZe – G2 – Heroic – OG – NAVI – NIP – Liquid – Vitality
After the publication of this article, we have reached out to ESL and BLAST to get a comment on
