DIG FBI: “I really do believe that we can achieve great things, and hopefully — I don’t even want to say it — bring Dignitas a championship.”
Interview conducted after Dignitas’s elimination from LCS Lock-In
Q: From my view, today was an emotional rollercoaster — starting with the SR 2-0 and ending with a nailbiter loss against TL. What was the day like for you?
FBI: Yeah, I mean, like you said, obviously, we’re all very happy with winning against Shopify, and it is pretty sad to lose against Team Liquid in the tiebreaker match because I really think the game was ours, and I could have definitely played a lot better and been able to carry.
But at the end of the day, I think we still have so much room to improve, and we’ve only been scrimming together for like seven, eight days, and Team Liquid went to Korea and bootcamped and did all that. I’m just really proud of, honestly, everyone on the team because I think we’ve really made a lot of improvements already in this short amount of time, and there’s no shame in losing to Team Liquid. I think they’re obviously a solid team with good players. So it is what it is.
Q: Considering your visa issues, this is definitely a solid result. It’s good to hear you have a positive takeaway.
FBI: Yeah, I mean, for sure. And I think generally in split one, I feel like a lot of teams are trying to just find their groove and find their kind of playstyle and just really mesh everyone together. And honestly, a lot of teams are just bad in split one. And I think that a team like Cloud9, who have had continuity from 4 out of 5 of their roster last split, are obviously showing why that cohesion within a team is really important.
I think they’re doing very well at the moment, and that’s just because they kept 4 out of 5 of the same roster. So obviously they’re a lot ahead of other teams, and they also went to Korea playing KESPA Cup and all that. So I’m honestly not too worried, and I think that we do, believe it or not, have a lot of potential to improve, and I really do have high hopes for this team.
Q: It feels like (maybe with the exception of one team) every LCS team has a lot of potential, for the first time — every series is impressively close.
FBI: Yeah, I mean, I definitely could agree with that sentiment. I think that maybe in the past, I feel like a lot of the lower-tier teams were a bit scared or hesitant to team fight, or you could clearly see that, yeah, like they were either just getting gapped in lanes or like they just refused to teamfight and slowly lost the game. But I’m happy to see that everyone in the league is quite bloodthirsty.
I think that’s kind of how you get better at League of Legends, because I do think you can have all the macro in the world, but then the day it all comes down to teamfighting, and I think that it’s pretty similar in Europe right now, I think in Europe, there’s also just every team beating every team.
And it’s kind of hard to assess, really, who the top teams are and distinguish, I guess, between the lower-tier teams. I would probably put Cloud9 just purely based on continuity of their roster at number one. And they’ve shown the most solid performances on stage. After that, I really don’t know how to rank the teams, to be honest.
Q: You’ve never really had bad results in the LCS — even when you’re expected to. Inspired called it “knowing how to win”; he thought that, no matter what, players like you, Palafox, and Ignar know how to consistently play to win-conditions. Does that resonate?
FBI: I don’t know about that because I think that the game is always evolving. I think that win conditions change a lot throughout every season, and personally, I’m just a fan of fighting. I think last year on 100 Thieves, we all just played to fight anything. […]
Obviously you don’t want to go too hard on that, and not like play any macro, but I do think that’s the way to improve a team the fastest — […] teamfighting is everything, especially nowadays in the game. You’re not really ever gonna see too much split pushing winning the game.
Q: So what, in your view, is going wrong for SR?
FBI: I would say that it’s really hard to speculate from the outside. I don’t think they have much team cohesion there. I do believe they were one of the teams that went to Korea and bootcamped before the split, so that’s a bit puzzling to me. But I think that, I mean, there can be a variety of issues within a team that you just won’t be able to know from the outside.
And I think that, I don’t know, like Zinie is new and he might not be able to speak much English, I don’t know how the communication works, but I do think that the team has really good players on the team. So it’s definitely possible that they bounce back for split two. I have a really high opinion of Contractz. Obviously, I played with him, and I know that when he’s on form, he can do a lot for a team. Then I mean, Zinie was hyped. […]
I think in split one with this format, it’s just too short to really have a good understanding of the landscape of all the teams. Yeah, I’m not really too sure.
Q: This feels like the first-ever DIG roster with potential from the start of the year — is the plan to keep scrimming through the break as you build your team structure?
FBI: Yeah, I do believe that we will be scrimming for two to three weeks, and then we’re going to be taking a one to two week break, and then we’re going to get back into scrims because we play in April for split two start. So, yeah, we will be scrimming for most of this early off-season for us.
Q: How do you get good practice in that time without any stage games to look forward to — and without definitively “strong” teams to measure yourself against?
FBI: Yeah, 100%. I think that’s definitely a really good point and I think that we’re just gonna have to take accountability for our own individual play in scrims and just work on the things that we believe we need to work on and I think that our coaching staff is doing a really good job on getting the team aligned and I’m trying my best to help out where I can as well. I think that our team’s practice atmosphere and environment are really good, so I don’t really think there were many problems.
It can be a bit draining, or boring, or like it doesn’t feel like anything to play for when you’re scrimming, knowing that you’re not going to play for two months. With that being said, because we didn’t really get to play many games together, I still feel like it’s very [honeymoon phase], and I think that we have a lot of room to grow.
I think we’re all really motivated because we all do believe that we can actually, like, do really good things in the next split. So I don’t think we have too many issues there.
Q: The broadcast showed you and Ignar calling out SR for Palafox — did you feel like the team was playing for revenge? Is that something you can all hold onto for motivation?
FBI: Not for me, but I definitely know that Palafox had a bit of a chip on his shoulder. And I will say that I think Palafox is actually doing very well in scrims at the moment. I think his only weakness is he can get a bit emotional at times, but aside from that, I think he’s actually been doing pretty well. So I have a lot of faith in him.
Obviously, we won a championship together, so I know the peaks that he can have, and I’m sure that we’re going to do something great again this year together. But, it was a bit sad because it was also a grudge match for our coach in the tiebreaker — I kind of let him down a bit because I think I definitely should have been able to carry the game. So at least we got one. At least we got one grudge match.
Q: Today, I think you’ve done something impressive: You created new DIG fans. Any message to them?
FBI: Really appreciate your guys’ support, and obviously, it’s pretty disappointing for us as well that our split has come to an end so early, but, like I’ve said multiple times throughout this interview, I really do believe that we can achieve great things, and hopefully — I don’t even want to say it — bring Dignitas a championship.
Transcription assistance from @flomillinoflo
Header Image Credit: Riot Games
