FLY Inspired: “NA players, some of them have decent mechanics, but I think they just don’t have brain.”

(Interview conducted after FLY vs LYON, Week 3, Day 1)

Q: What do you think of this C9 vs TL draft and who’s going to win?

Inspired: I don’t know, honestly. I feel like TL got their best champ on every single player. If they don’t win this game, then I don’t know what draft TL needs. Feel like TL should find a way to win. [E/N: TL lost.]

Q: Are you confident FLY is the best team in the league?

Inspired: I mean, I don’t know. I’m the best jungler in the league for sure. And I think I view the game well, and I think I’m good at giving […] knowledge and ideas to my team. And I think I’m really happy with the progress they’re making. I think everyone is on the same page on how we should play.

As long as we keep performing like we do in most of our practice games and like we do on stage so far, I’m confident we’re gonna win. So, like, hopefully, we don’t switch back into playing kinda without thinking because I think that was our biggest problem last year. There was a lot of games that were-

Q: Last year or in Brazil?

Inspired: I mean, Brazil probably as well. I mean, I don’t even remember because I just deleted it from my memory. Because overall players, especially our bot lane, just didn’t really use brain that much when they played. They just played on their mechanics because they’re very good mechanically.

And right now, me and coaching staff are pushing them that they need to, like, calm down with mechanics and just use their brain, and I think they are doing a really good job. Like, so far, the games on stage and in practice, seems like they actually have a plan when they play. And, I think if they have a plan how they wanna play, and they are obviously better mechanically than every other player on in the role in the league, I think they will be very solid. And I think if, that happens, I think we will win the league.

Q: Do you get déjà vu playing with Massu and Busio? On your PROS episode this week with with Impact and Vulcan, you described a similar thing with Jojopyun, where, you’re like “I know he’s mechanically good, can he use his brain?”

Inspired: Yep. It’s for sure the same, yeah. I think, overall, NA players, some of them have decent mechanics, but I think they just don’t have brain. And sadly, there is not many people in the league that actually have brain to teach the new players. They come into [a] mediocre team, they are playing with mediocre players and mediocre coaches that don’t actually know the game, but they think they know the game, and they try teaching them. And then it just becomes a mess. And if you already learned the game in one way, it’s kinda hard to re-learn it.

I think that was kinda the issue with Busio. I think he learned the game a certain way on 100 Thieves, and I just couldn’t believe [someone taught] him a lot of concepts. So, it was kinda hard at the beginning, but I think right now, he really understands his job. And it’s like, [he’s a] completely different player than he used to be at the beginning of the last year.

So, yeah, I think, the biggest difference, like, [for] the young players that never played competitive— I think they need to get into a good environment if they wanna succeed. Because I do believe that NA has some mechanically talented players, but there is no one that can really teach them the game well.

So I think that’s why, like, it’s been for a long time, [that] like, the team with Impact, the team with CoreJJ, then ever since I joined, the team with me, like, finishes kinda high up— because I think we just do [a] good job at teaching the players on how they should progress the game. And I think, obviously, you can’t teach everything. Sometimes people make mistakes, and you have worse games, and then you’re just not always meant to win. But, the teams with these type of players always are contenders to win it though.

Q: Do you think River is the same way? Because I hear similar things about River from his teammates, and he always does finish quite well.

Inspired: Yeah, I mean, maybe possibly he is like that as well. I think playing against him, [it] seems like he does understand the game. Sometimes he’s just a bit crazy with the stuff he does, so I’m just not really sure how to judge it. Like, I would need to see the inside of the team, right?

It’s hard for me to judge it exactly, but, the way he plays, he for sure is the the leader in the game. I can tell just by watching him play and playing against him. But, I think sometimes he just does a bit crazy stuff that sometimes pays off and sometimes it doesn’t. He for sure is that type of person, yeah.

Q: Do you have any recent fun anecdotes with the team?

Inspired: Not recently. I mean, recently, we’ve been playing League all the time…

Q: Older stories are fine too.

Inspired: Oh, older stories. I don’t really know, honestly. We are not that funny. We just come to the office. We play League all day. And yeah, we are just trash talking each other for, like, funny plays. When we go into solo queue and I see Alan first timing Gragas support, then he goes Phase Rush and goes full AP and he’s inting, then it’s always pretty funny to watch him play and then trash talk him a bit. Or Massu plays some random champ and doesn’t know what his job is, or I autofill on some role and I int, so…

Q: You’re always autofilling, right?

Inspired: Yeah. I mean, I think the region’s solo queue is way too bad to practice seriously. So, I just rather practice mechanics on the champs that actually require it, which is mid and ADC. I think those roles require the most mechanics, so I just play that.

Because, yeah, I think jungle role doesn’t really require much mechanics. It’s more of a team play role, and in solo queue team play obviously doesn’t exist. So it’s just pointless to even take any ideas from solo queue or, like, try to practice any concepts because you just learn wrong things. So it’s better to just focus on playing lane and I think that way you can either improve your mechanics or improve the knowledge of how strong certain champs are at certain points of the game.

Q: So that’s sharpening the mechanical side. When you sharpen your understanding of the game, are you watching LCK, LPL VODs all the time? LEC VODs?

Inspired: To me the game is very simple. I think there is not much […] left […] to learn about the game from, like, watching the game. It’s more like you watch teams and see what champs they prioritize and why. Because I think the game plan depends a lot on the draft. So, like, you see why they prio certain champs, and do they agree with our prios?

Because, obviously, in the draft, you decide kinda how your game plan is gonna go. And, then I just see, like, how Asian teams decide to pick, like, whenever Yone is meta. Like, I mean, Yone is meta for so long, like, how [do] they play around Yone? And when they decide to give Yone, what do they do in order to win the game when enemy team has a broken champ? So, yeah, I don’t think I need VODs to watch to learn the game itself. It’s more like you just stay up to date with the current patch and see what champs are good and why they are good. So I think that’s why you mostly watch VODs.

Q: Do you do a good amount of watching VODs or not really?

Inspired: I always look at the games— what people pick, and [I] just look at what caused the game to go in their favor. So I don’t really, like, watch much past 25 minutes because usually that’s where team fighting will come [into] play. But if the game is even, I’ll obviously check what’s happening past twenty five minutes.

But usually, you just see how the team got the lead and why did they get it— is it because their draft was stronger, or enemy team just made a mistake, or they just had a really good plan to execute? So I always pay attention to good teams or, like, honestly, most of the teams in tier one regions— what they do in order to win the games.

Q: That implies you’ve been keeping up with LEC. What do you think about the region? And do you think you would still crush the region if you were back there?

Inspired: I do think the region [overall] is better than NA. I think they are way better than NA. I think the top teams in NA can easily contend, contest the EU teams. But I think, like, bottom four in NA would finish last place in EU, while I think the bottom four in EU would be, like, fifth place […] in NA.

But I think the top four of NA can also try to win LEC. So the league is just less competitive in NA, I would say. In EU the teams, even the bottom teams, I think, they can take games away from […] the top tier teams.

I think the players there, there’s just [a] bigger pool of good players. So I just think you just need to be way more focused in every game if you play in EU in order to win, while I think in LCS, it just comes down to these few games that you play against the best teams, basically in playoffs. So, yeah, I would say that the region is just less competitive in LCS. But as the best team[s], I don’t think they are way worse than EU — I feel like they might even be better.

Q: Do you think do you have any particular thoughts on EU’s best jungler? People say Razork, Yike, or Skewmond.

Inspired: I mean, I do think that Skewmond has a good idea when he plays the game, and seems like Yike also does it. I think Skewmond is probably the best jungler in that region. I think Yike is fine on his champs. I don’t think he’s that insane; I think he’s just very solid. Like, he just usually doesn’t make many mistakes — sometimes he overforces some plays for no reason, which I kinda dislike about him. Skewmond doesn’t really overforce stuff, he has a solid game plan and he just plays towards win conditions. I think he’s just EU Canyon.

I think he plays pretty well, and I think he has decent mechanics. So I don’t really know how smart he is during the game, because, obviously, I don’t know that. But, just looking from the outside, [it] seems like he’s the guy that plays the game. And from different teams, it’s hard to judge a jungler, I think, when, the team is a bit weak, and I didn’t really see anyone, like, particularly pop off.

I don’t think Razork is that good. I think he has been playing for Fnatic for so long, and he has had so many good teammates. There was a lot of points where the other teams were looking pretty weak, and he never managed to win a season. I think that’s pretty disappointing if you ask me, and I just had a pretty weak memory of playing against him. I think every time I faced him, he was doing just fine or just, like, not too good. So he never really impressed me.

But, obviously, I played against him a while ago. But just from watching his games, I just feel like he doesn’t really understand the game that well. He’s very aggressive. I think […] if his team is way better than enemies, I think he will snowball the game. But I think in close games, he might be a lose con for his team. If the game is slow and you just play, like, two even teams match each other, I think he might be the lose con for his team.

Q: Where would you put Skewmond against NA Junglers?

Inspired: I think me and him are probably two best junglers in EU & NA combined. You can decide who whoever you think is better, but I think it’s us two.