There will be North American teams to support in the second half of 2023!

Complexity underlined their commitment to the NA scene Thursday night with the signing of Jonathan "EliGE" Jablonowski to the team. But what about Evil Geniuses? The Seattle-based organization had been linked with European players such as Audric "⁠JACKZ⁠" Jug, Aleksandr "⁠zorte⁠" Zagodyrenko, and Denis "⁠electroNic⁠" Sharipov during the summer. But none of the above-mentioned players were part of the announcement Saturday evening, where EG made their intentions clear about the future.

The five now former EG Black players will be promoted to the main team, where only Timothy "⁠autimatic⁠" Ta survives from the original team. Vincent "⁠Brehze⁠" Cayonte, Jerric "⁠wiz⁠" Jiang, Ismail "⁠refrezh⁠" Ali, and Sanzhar "⁠neaLaN⁠" Iskhakov have all been benched and will be allowed to search for a new home.

Jadan "⁠HexT⁠" Postma, Colby "⁠Walco⁠" Walsh, Paytyn "⁠junior⁠" Johnson, and Jeorge "⁠Jeorge⁠" Endicott will replace the four players, while the last player from the old EG Black, William "⁠RUSH⁠" Wierzba, will be a 6th player ready to stand-in.

EG also announced the departure of their Danish head coach Daniel "Vorborg" Vorborg, who will also be replaced by the coach of EG Black, Tommy "⁠Axed⁠" Ryan.

autimatic

Junior

HexT

jeorgesnorts

Walco

Evil Geniuses

EG announced their new AWPer Paytyn "junior" Johnson on Twitter. The 22-year-old is joining EG black after seven months on the Complexity bench. junior played two matches with the EG black roster before getting a permeant deal. Most recently, EG black lost 2-0 to Strife in the Fl0m Cup 2023. While being sidelined by Complexity, the young AWPer has kept himself in shape, competing in small online tournaments with Gas Money. 

EG Black will play their next match on February 23 when they take upon Davenport University in the ESL Challenger League Season 44 North America.

junior is averaging 1.21 rating | 0.61 DPR | 75.2% Kast | 1.07 impact | 83.1 ADR during the past three months.

{cflag:CA} Peter "⁠stanislaw⁠" Jarguz

{cflag:US} Jeorge "⁠Jeorge⁠" Endicott

{cflag:US} Tommy "⁠Axed⁠" Ryan (coach)

EG Black

Complexity is on the market for a new primary AWPer to replace Paytyn “junior” Johnson, Dust2.us can tell in a recent report. The reported demotion of the 21-year-old sniper comes after a strugglesome year for both him and Complexity.

During the first seven months of 2022, junior has averaged a career-low 0.91 rating having battled to find a decent individual level while playing top-tier tournaments.

If the rumors are true, Complexity is set to field the following lineup.  

{cflag:US} Paytyn "junior" Johnson (Inactive)

compLexity Gaming

There are not a lot of positive things for Complexity to take with them on to the summer break after being eliminated at IEM Cologne, but still in-game leader Ioannis 'Johnny' "JT" Theodosiou tried to keep his head up high after a difficult time for the roster.

[slugORMA:{"slug":"astralis-knocks-complexity-iem-cologne-play-in","isNewTab":true}]

- For most of us, this is our first tier-1 season. So it is a little rough. We are trying to get into it and trying to get used to the environment, especially on LAN. This season was supposed to be a warm-up and something for us to improve as a team. Obviously, it's been going terribly. For most of us, this is probably the worst three months that we have had in our careers. Especially myself, FaNg, and junior. It's been a rough time. We need to get back on the server and grind as hard as we can and try to get back into it.

See the full interview with JT down below.

FaNg

Four out of five North American teams clocked in a victory in the second round of the Swiss Group Stage at the Regional Major Ranking tournament in Bucharest for the teams of North and South America.

Most notable was the Team Liquid slaughter of TeamOne. Jonathan "EliGE" Jablonowski and the rest of the Liquid roster looked highly motivated to prove that the early defeat of the day against 00NATION was a fluke.

[slugORMA:{"slug":"team-liquid-destroyed-coldzeras-00nation","isNewTab":true}]

Evil Geniuses also retaliated with their first win on European soil in 278 days. Tsvetelin 'CeRq' Dimitrov was pivotal for the North Americans in their 16-5 against 9z.

The North American star of the day was found in Complexity's outstanding 16-5 win against 00NATION. Paytyn 'junior' Johnson went 27-8 in K-D on Nuke against the South Americans to put Complexity 2-0 up on the scoreboard alongside FURIA, Imperial, and MIBR. The four teams are now in a prime position to secure their spot at the Antwerpen Major.

The RMR tournament continues tomorrow. Teams that are 2-0 up or 2-0 down will play BO3 from here on.

CeRq

Team Liquid

Another North American team has confirmed their roster for the upcoming season. Complexity announced today that they have signed the current Extra Salt roster.

With the announcement Complexity and team owner Jason Lake (in picture) underlined their commitment to NA Counter-Strike with the words "We are coming home". The new lineup consists of four North Americans and the South African player Johnny "⁠JT⁠" Theodosiou.

Michael "⁠Grim⁠" Wince and Paytyn "⁠junior⁠" Johnson transfers from Team Liquid and FURIA to complete the lineup with three Extra Salt players.

The team will make their debut tomorrow at Funspark Ultra 2021 Finals against no other than Gambit.

Grim

floppy

Extra Salt

The Funspark Ulti 2021 Finals is shaping up to be a very interesting tournament.

In five days we will get the first glimpse of A-tier competitive Counter-Strike again. At Funspark Ulti 2021 Finals the likes of Gambit, Astralis, BIG, and Fnatic will fight for the title and the $150.000 in first prize.

The North Americans from Extra Salt are also qualified for the event, and despite only having three players on the official roster, the NA team will still bring a strong lineup to the event. Both Paytyn "⁠junior⁠" Johnson and Michael "⁠Grim⁠" Wince have been announced on the roster for Funspark Ulti 2021 Finals. 

The two players were already rumored to join the Extra Salt trio in a deal with Complexity.

At Funspark Ulti the Extra Salt roster faces tough opposition in the opening round, where the NA team is paired with Gambit. 

Paytyn "junior" Johnson is no longer a part of the Brazilian Organization FURIA.

The 21-year-old American has been out of the FURIA server since the summer of 2021, where he was benched after the team struggled to perform at the beginning of 2021. Since August Paytyn "junior" Johnson has been loaned out to Bad News Bears. It is still unknown, if the AWP'er will continue on Bad News Bears, or he will look to join a new team.

FURIA

Bad News Bears

Rafael "saffee" Costa has been confirmed as a new signing at FURIA, the Brazilian organization announced this Thursday night. The 27-year-old AWPer will fill the void after the discarded Vinicius "⁠VINI⁠" Figueiredo, who were told that he wasn’t a part of FURIA’s plan going into the 2022 season.

- What a night, tomorrow I'll talk more calmly but for now I'm going to enjoy this moment... You asked for it and now FURIA-saffee is reality, saffee wrote on [link:{"url":"https://twitter.com/saffeecsgo/status/1479269285566586884","isNewTab":true,"text":"Twitter"}] following the transfer.

The powerful sniper has a big task in front of him, as he will try to fill out the shoes of the profiled Henrique “HEN1” Teles, who showed impressive levels with FURIA from his tenure between 2019-2021. Something, saffee’s predecessor, Paytyn “Junior” Johnson never managed to replicate.

[slugORMA:{"slug":"vini-part-furias-future","isNewTab":true}]

Despite being 27-year-old, saffee is a quite new figure on the top of competitive Counter-Strike, where the majority of the community first got eyes on him last year due to a phenomenal showing at paiN Gaming. 

The late bloomer led the Brazilian team to notable victories like DreamHack Open January 2021 NA, and were also a big part of their qualification to the PGL Stockholm Major at the end of the year.

saffee

VINI

HEN1

paiN

There is still no solution to FURIA's fifth-man problem. Since the departure of Henrique 'HEN1' Teles in December last year, the Brazilian team has tried different players. Most notable was the signing of Paytyn 'Junior' Johnson, who joined the team in January 2021. The American AWP'er never really settled in and was benched at the start of June. 

[slugORMA:{"slug":"junior-benched-furia","isNewTab":true}]

Lucas '⁠honda' Cano stepped in, but now the young Brazilian has been put on the sideline as well. Furia confirmed the news to the [link:{"url":"https://ge.globo.com/esports/csgo/noticia/csgo-furia-utilizara-drop-na-vaga-de-honda-na-pro-league.ghtml","isNewTab":true,"text":"Brazilian outlet ge"}], and stated that they were still actively searching for a new fifth player. For ESL Pro League, the Brazilians will try out their academy player André 'drop' Abreu. The change needs to be confirmed by ESL as an emergency transfer request, as 'drop' was not part of Furia's lineup for the tournament.

honda

drop

Crazy highlights sometimes happen in CS:GO, whether it be an impressive ACE clutch, a funny fail, or something completely different, Counter-Strike is full of these crazy moments. Another one of these moments was produced when Bad News Bears faced Astralis at ESL Pro League Season 14 earlier this day. 

Left alone with all five Astralis players still remaining, "junior" had to do the impossible to win the round for his team. Whilst he didn't manage to win the round he did hit a shot that would seem impossible. After a quick peek into "lobby", on the map of Nuke, the American sniper fires a no-scope at the enemy in "lobby". However, it isn't the lobby player who gets killed, but instead an unsuspecting Astralis player behind a wall. 

Take a look for yourself and see the absurd 3K from "junior" down below: 

[twitchClip:ZealousHealthyCoffeeMrDestructoid-JahhlFEhX5jQLlKw]

Astralis

Earlier this week, the North Americans from Bad News Bears lost their powerful AWPer Peter “ptr” Gurney, as he decided to retire from competitive CS:GO – Just two weeks before one of their biggest event ever in ESL Pro League Season 14.

[slugORMA:{"slug":"profiled-na-awper-retires-from-cs-go","isNewTab":true}]

However, Bad News Beats has already found ptr’s replacement, with the NA based team having secured the promising AWPer Paytyn “Junior” Johnson on a loan agreement. Junior’s current team, FURIA has allowed the 20-year-old to participate in the $750.000 event with his countrymen.

- With FURIA being very understanding, they've kindly allowed me to pursue other options in CS. Thanks to this, I’m going to be playing with Bad News Bears on loan for the duration of ESL Pro League - Looking forward to playing officials again!, Junior writes on Twitter. 

The announcement comes after a rather disappointing period for Junior, as the former Triumph player has been sidelined for two months on FURIA, owing to Lucas “honda” Cano taking his place on the Brazilian roster. ESL Pro League will begin on the 16th of August.

{cflag:US} Michael "⁠Swisher⁠" Schmid

{cflag:US} Alan "⁠Shakezullah⁠" Hardeman

{cflag:US} Paytyn "⁠junior⁠" Johnson (Stand-in)

Roles have changed on the FURIA roster after the benching of AWP'er Paytyn "Junior" Johnson.

[slugORMA:{"slug":"junior-benched-furia","isNewTab":false}]

In an interview with Pley.gg, in-game leader Andrei “arT” Piovezan talks about the new mindset, that he needs to approach the game with after he is now the main AWP'er on the team.

- I have more responsibility on my back. I have to think more about my actions. As an AWP'er you need to be the anchor and stay alive to support. So that is the mindset, that I need to change for some setups on different maps, the Brazilian explains.

It will be interesting to see how it will work out for FURIA. Statistics wise "arT" is the most aggressive player in Counter-Strike history. Throughout his career, he has been involved in the most opening duels of all players. The aggressiveness will now have to be transferred to the rest of the FURIA players.

- They have more responsibility to take map control and take action, which is kind of hard for them to do because they are used to me doing all that. So it is definitely an adaption period for us, the 25-year-old FURIA player says.

You can see the interview below, where you can also hear, what it will mean for FURIA, that they can now talk in Portuguese again, after Lucas "honda" Honda joined the roster.

After a long time of lackluster performances, the American AWP'er Paytyn "

The coach of FURIA, Nicholas "⁠guerri⁠" Nogueira, stated in a video, that the decision was made after the American had asked to return home after a tough month, where the AWP'er had averaged only a 0.89 rating.

The Brazilian coach emphasized the language barrier outside the server as a problem. The Academy player Lucas "⁠honda⁠" Cano will join the roster as a fifth man instead. honda made his debut for FURIA in January, where he made three aces against G2 at the BLAST Premier Global Finals.

The renowned analyst, Richard Lewis takes a closer look at Brazil’s CS:GO saviors FURIA. After a rollercoaster set of perfromances during their DreamHack Masters Spring Group Stage, arT and company find themselves against a rampant NAVI squad. But there’s a big green thorn in their side, and his name is junior.

Richard believes that HEN1’s replacement has to step-up if they want to perform at their maximum, as his lack of consistency is coating them against the best teams in the world. While the American AWPer might be at a sticking point, Richard explains that their issues may run deeper than just on player.

Furia has been seeded directly into the Quarter-Finals of the tournament. Here they will face Tomáš "oskar" Šťastný and his teammates from the Czech roster SinnerS.

The two teams fight for a chance to face forZe, who made quite an upset earlier today with a win against Team Spirit.

[slugRMA:forze-eliminates-team-spirit-spring-sweet-spring]

SinnerS

After defeats on Day 1 for both Furia and paiN, the two Brazilian rosters were paired in the lower brackets for an early elimination match at DreamHack Masters Spring.

Furia was big favorites beforehand, but against their countrymen, they had to work hard for the victory.

On Nuke the two teams traded rounds until 8-8, where Kaike 'KSCERATO' Cerato has had enough and started to heat up. The 21-year-old rifler pushed his team to finally distance themselves from paiN. A good T-side from Furia gave them a 16-12 win on their opponent's map pick.

Mirage started one-sided with Furia in control. But after the break paiN began to fight back. The experienced Brazilian side has fought hard in the North American region to qualify for an A-tier event, so they would not go out without a bang. Down 4-11, they came back and took the lead at 12-11. But then the only non-Brazilian player on the server stepped up. Paytyn 'junior' Johnson made several important kills with the AWP to allow his team to regain control, and in the end, it was enough to secure the victory.

Furia is now ready for the next round, where they will face the loser of Astralis vs Complexity. paiN is out of the tournament after two straight defeats.

Furia - paiN 2-0 | DreamHack Masters Spring 2021

16-12 (Nuke) | {cflag:BR} KSCERATO – 1.59 Rating / 28-16 K/D / 101.2 ADR 

16-12 (Mirage) | {cflag:US} junior – 1.36 Rating / 21-11 K/D / 73.7 ADR

MVP: {cflag:BR} Kaike 'KSCERATO' Cerato - 1.39 Rating / 48-34 K-D / 93.1 ADR

KSCERATO

The opening (bo1) rounds at DreamHack Master Spring gave the following results.

Biggest surprise was the huge Furia defeat. On Vertigo the American AWP'er Paytyn 'junior' Johnson played a horrible map with a 6-20 K-D scoreline.

Team Vitality lost another match. This time with the new player Jayson 'Kyojin' Nguyen Van on the roster. The Frenchman had a difficult debut.

17.30: Fiend - Spirit (Lower bracket elimination match)

19.55: Natus Vincere - Virtus.pro (Upper semi-final)

19.55: mousesports - FaZe (Lower bracket elimination match)

13.30: Extra Salt - Team Vitality (Lower bracket elimination match)

13.30: Furia - paiN (Lower bracket elimination match)

16.45: Astralis - Complexity (Upper semi-final)

Kyojin

Team Vitality

We will have another Gambit vs Heroic thriller match! The Russian squad made their way to the Semi-Final at BLAST Premier Spring Showdown after a 2-0 win against Furia.

On Mirage there was never really any doubt of the outcome after a strong opening from Gambit. An 8-1 lead was quickly established, and with Dmitry 'sh1ro' Sokolov in great shape, the 1-0 lead was inevitable. sh1ro made 17 AWP kills during the map, which ended 16-6 in favor of the Russians.

Mirage (16-6) Gambit |sh1ro - 1.76 rating / 26-10 K-D / 102.7

On Overpass Furia fought back. Paytyn 'junior' Johnson took revenge from his lackluster performance on Mirage and helped his team with 12 AWP kills in the first half. Despite a good start to the first half, Furia only managed to lead 8-7 at the break.

In a nailbiter ending, the Brazilians got the better of Gambit with some important calls in the end from the in-game leader Andrei 'arT' Piovezan. A twist to the match, which was now going to a third and final map.

Overpass (16-14) Furia |junior - 1.59 rating / 30-15 K-D / 101.4 ADR

A few days ago Furia dismantled Astralis at ESL Pro League with 16-2 on Train. A memorable performance, which the Brazilians could take into today's match, which was to be decided on the rails. 

Here Gambit was off to a flying start. They started as Counter-Terrorists and quickly shut down the offense of Furia. With the exciting ending to Overpass in mind, it was almost a disappointment to see such a one-sided half ending 12-3 in favor of Gambit. With the huge lead in mind, it never really got competitive in the second half. With Ax1Le, sh1ro, and Hobbit all producing close to 100 ADR each, there was simply nothing to do for Furia to make the comeback. Gambit closed the map 16-5 to secure a spot in the Semi-Finals at BLAST Premier Spring Showdown. 

Train (16-5) Gambit |Hobbit - 1.86 rating / 22-8 K-D / 104.6

Gambit will now get their rematch with Heroic, who defeated them at ESL Pro League last week. A spot in the BLAST Spring Finals is at stake. 

MVP: Dmitry 'sh1ro' Sokolov - 1.36 rating / 62-38 K-D / 83.6

nafany

sh1ro

Gambit Esports

In the early stages of this year, the promising North American Paytyn “Junior” Johnson left his home country to join the Brazilian top team FURIA. The transfer was on many levels a very interesting and ground-breaking move, as he joined a fully stacked Brazilian roster, where every member speaks Portuguese, but also in the way that he was a rather inexperienced and untested player.

[slugRMA:junior-becomes-furias-new-awper]

We have sat down with the man himself, to talk about his first months at FURIA and how he has coped with the pressure of joining such a great organization and team.

- Being on a top CSGO team like FURIA, I have realized how serious they treat their jobs; this is their life and their skill is amazing. And playing with these Brazilians, I’ve realized that there is no weak player or weak link in the team. In any given match, every member of the team could win you the game.

Junior clutches home a tough round vs Astralis at ESL Pro League:

[twitchClip:CaringDepressedSkunkJKanStyle-FbF7XULfGpo9NeL1]

Very early into Junior’s stint at FURIA, it was clear to see that he and Andrei “arT” Piovezan had a special bond and partnership inside the server. The young American looked to thrive under the FURIA IGL and his extremely aggressive playstyle, where a potential double-AWP setup also was revealed.

The way he plays has opened my eyes to a different way of the game in how it’s played, and how there’s nobody else in the world who does the same.

I think with more time arT and I can make the aggressive double-AWP very strong in the future. We just need more time to figure out how we should use it.

Junior hasn’t presented the same high individual level at FURIA as he previously has displayed at Triumph. However, the 20-year old talent is still very confident regarding his future in CS:GO and at FURIA.

- My personal goal is obviously to be the best player I can be under FURIA. In some time, I hope to become a really good international player and play some LANs and get more experience. I think for sure that I have the ability to become a great player and I just have to keep working hard.

As a team, our goal is to remain in the Top 10 for the whole year, but who knows how fast we will improve maybe we can get #1 on HLTV but we need more practice for sure before I can solidify anything.

[image:{"source":"cloudinary","publicId":"teams/Furia/Copyright_-_Carlton-Beener_-_Furia_1_nf8gtu","originalWidth":3840,"originalHeight":2160,"cloudinaryAssetData":true,"cloudName":"pley-gg","format":"jpg","caption":"Credit: Carlton Beener ESL","alt":"CS:GO, Counter-Strike"}]

The 2021-edition of FURIA haven't been as frightening as we have seen before.

Junior and the rest of FURIA will be back in action today at 18:30 (CET), as they take on MIBR in a thrilling Brazilian battle at BLAST Premier Spring Showdown. The winner of the match advance to the quarterfinals, while the loser must head home empty-handed. 

	30 days	90 days
Fixture count	0	0
Maps count	0	0

Junior

Player stats

Articles mentioning Junior

Official: EG stick with NA roster

Former Complexity Sniper announced on EG Black

Junior out? Complexity targeting a new AWPer

JT: For most of us this has been the worst three months of our careers

NA strikes back in second round of American RMR

Complexity sign Extra Salt roster

Grim and junior joins Extra Salt at upcoming event

junior leaves FURIA

FURIA confirm saffee acquisition

FURIA bench honda

Highlight: Absurd 3K from junior

Junior to stand in for profiled NA team at ESL Pro League

arT in a new role: I need to change my mindset

Junior benched on FURIA

Analyst: FURIA are wildly inconsistent

Live: Furia vs SinnerS

Furia survives Brazilian brawl at DH Masters

Favorites makes it through opening round at DreamHack Masters Spring

Gambit ready for Heroic rematch

Junior: I think for sure that I have the ability to become a great player

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