LYON Oddie: “It’s more a mentality thing. […] It’s not a player problem.”

Q: How do you even go about fixing this in the offseason?

Oddie: It’s kinda hard to tell, to be honest.

There are so many pieces we need to adapt or change. I feel like I don’t know what to say, but it’s kinda hard to tell what we should do to face the next split. I feel like, obviously, it’s gonna be everyone’s fault when we throw, or when we make some dumb decisions. But at this point, we really have no more time left. I think we only have one more split, and we’re probably gonna see changes in the roster. Most likely. 

I’m not gonna say [what’s gonna change], but I feel like it’s gonna be way different. [The problem] is more a mentality thing. We change when we play on stage. There’s some really good days, some really bad days.

It’s not a player problem [with] different skill levels. Sometimes, when you’re worse than the enemy, you’re just gonna lose. But I don’t feel like we have weak team members. I feel like it’s more a mentality thing. I don’t know how to fix that, [and we’ve tried].

I don’t know what’s the one [thing] we need to do. I don’t think everyone is happy right now.

Q: How do you help the team avoid tilt in game?

Oddie: The problem I have is when something happens [on] a scrim day. If something bad happens […] I cannot say: “Okay. Let’s focus this, play this.” We’re just gonna play like that the rest of the day. That’s why some people stress too much on an individual mistake or some [kind of] mistake. So it’s kinda hard for me to keep everyone’s [energy] up, because when everything goes down[…], mine also goes down.

I used to be on teams that, even when we were winning LLA, things happen and we have bad scrim days, but [here], the environment is really bad to practice. So I’m not sure [what] everyone’s mentality is gonna be like.

For example, [the] Korean players are really, really good individually. And I think Eric and Lyonz are also really good players. But there [are] some kinds of mistakes that right now, there is no [forgiveness].

There is no room for mistakes. You know? If someone [makes] mistakes in one game, they [are] just gonna tilt a bit. But if the mistake keeps happening, it’s like, “Today’s gonna be really bad.”

Q: So people don’t leave room for others to make mistakes, or themselves?

Oddie: Yeah, [for others]. When someone makes mistakes […] they are just gonna keep focusing on this. For example, [if] I’m ganking mid, and I miss my stun for some reason, somebody watches that and after the scrim asks very loudly, “Why [did] you do this?” Or, makes really really harsh criticism. But those kinds of things make the environment really hard when you have a bad game, a bad day.

Q: Because you feel like everyone’s blaming you? 

Oddie: It’s not everyone, but I feel like the environment goes down because when you practice and you make mistakes, fine. If you can keep playing, it’s fine.

But if the mistake makes [the rest of the team] play worse, […] then scrims or practice is not helpful. So those kinds of things need to change. And I don’t know how to fix [it] because I think it’s everyone’s mentality. 

Even me, I have bad days, but I‘m not gonna blame anybody. I’m just gonna keep to myself. Maybe I [won’t] talk too much, or I think a bit defensively. But I’m not the kind of guy who’s gonna [pester] you. 

Today, to be honest, I think drafts were kinda hard. Like, first game, I don’t know how we ended up with four AP [champs] and a Varus. So [that was] a mistake. The second one, that’s what we talked about before. We really liked the comp, we wanna do [that kind of] comp in the first game. But everything changes. So I don’t know. Today is weird. 

Like I said before, we have everything to fight the top teams. I don’t think it’s a player gap. We just… it depends on the day of “us”. That’s why it’s so weird because if we play tomorrow, I don’t know which phase we’re gonna [show up]. 

For us – or for me, at least – [beating Dignitas] today shouldn’t be a problem. I don’t think they’re bad, but I think we are better. But things happened, and it’s [hard] for me to understand what happened today.

Q: In the off season, are you planning on going back to Peru to visit family and your wife?

I’m not sure yet. Actually, my wife was coming today. 

Q: Oh, she was here?

No, but she is coming today. We wanted to win, so I’m not sure what’s gonna happen. […] [I can spend] some time with her. But I’m going to spend time thinking about what happened today. This feels weird. Like, this shouldn’t happen.