Less than a week after SpaceStation Gaming lifted the ALGS Split 2 Playoffs trophy, the team announced they were splitting up. For IGL Josue ‘Phony’ Ruiz, he assumed the three players would be going their separate ways, due to personal differences. As it transpired, his teammates Israel ‘Koyful’ Lawrence and Brody ‘Xynew’ Geissler wanted to continue together, without him.
“They just didn’t see me fit to IGL them,” Phony recalls. “Which is perfectly fine, it happens. It happens with many teams. I just wish that I [knew] beforehand and that it was going to be them and not me. It wasn’t made clear.”
The team had decided before the tournament that they would split up, win or lose, but clutching first place made Phony wonder if they could reconcile their differences and continue their success together.
“It was an amazing feeling,” he says of winning the ALGS LAN, something only four teams have ever done. “I thought we would be able to work it out. You expect the team to win a tournament and still be able to work something out, try to fix something, because obviously something was there. That just wasn’t the case.
“It is what it is. The boys are still the GOATs in my mind. I love Xyn and I love Koy, they’re f*cking insane.”
It’s a very mature outlook on what was undoubtedly a rough situation. Phony is the first to admit that, after being effectively dropped by his two teammates, he was incredibly disappointed and his motivation to look for a new team was at an all-time low.
He put out a speculative tweet, but wasn’t actively looking for something new. However, it was support from Indonesian player Gen Ghi ‘StrafingFlame’ Subroto and Falcons coach Kyle ‘Draugr’ Gillard that pushed him to prove himself to the world. He just didn’t know that doing so would require him to relocate 8,000 miles across continents.
“The one [person] that stuck with me the most, I guess, was StrafingFlame,” he says. “He was constantly reaching out to me. And he basically told me, if you want your reputation to be built back, if you want people to actually respect you as the IGL that you know you are, you need to showcase that you can do it with another team. Even if it costs you going to Thailand.”
An 8,000 Mile Journey
And move to Thailand he did, joining Guild Esports, the organisation co-owned by David Beckham. Joining a team with a LAN ticket already booked was pretty much the only way Phony could secure his place at the ALGS Championship on such short notice, so he’s determined to make the most of this opportunity. That’s not to say he relished the idea of moving to a new continent, especially one with so many cautionary tales about the state of Apex Legends servers in the country.
“I felt horrible, to be honest,” Phony admits. “I didn’t want to move from North America to the APAC South region. Especially from all the horror stories that I heard about the ping and how bad the servers are, how bad the ranked is over there with cheaters. I just didn’t want to have to go through that – especially since I was going to be there alone. It was going to be very stressful.”
“You need to showcase that you can do it with another team.”
However, he found salvation in Taylor ‘arctic’ McNeil, a British Apex pro who was also moving to Thailand, to join up with his new Disguised teammates. The unlikely pair decided to room together, helping each other adjust to such an enormous lifestyle change. It wasn’t always smooth sailing between them, but they “were glad to have each other.”
Was it worth it? For the chance to get to the ALGS Championship and make waves with new teammates, Phony only has one answer. “Coming into this tournament, if I didn’t go to Thailand, it wouldn’t be as easy as it is now.”
New Teammates, And The Coach Who Brought Them Together
Fortunately, fitting in with his new Guild teammates, Australian pair Benjamin ‘Jesko’ Spaseski and Tom ‘Legacy’ Canty was smooth sailing. Phony sought out the pair to play with as often as he could thanks to language barriers preventing him from finding Thai teams to rank with, and he felt the duo was respectful and listened to his calls when it mattered.
“They literally trusted in every call I made,” he explains. “They listened to literally every single thing, which is good and bad, but I was glad to know that they trusted me enough to allow me to lead them. And that respect is still here to this day.”
The fourth piece to this puzzle is coach ‘Winnie’ Long, someone Phony mentions throughout our interview. “Winnie helps the team, realistically, probably more so than I do,” he says.
She’s “reassuring” and has worked with Jesko and Legacy for so long that they’ve built a great understanding together. As the newcomer to the squad, she’s been welcoming too, and has helped smooth over the transition to having a new IGL to lead the team.
It’s this reassurance that is clearly so important to Phony. After feeling undermined by his teammates pulling the rug from underneath him at SSG, he finally has teammates who listen to him and respect him, and that allows him to be the best leader he can be. That mutual respect is an important aspect of any team, but without Winnie there to ensure the strong foundations of the team stay strong, Phony is certain they wouldn’t be where they are today.
“If you look at us playing or us walking around the venue, if Winnie’s there in any way, she’s catering to me to make sure I’m okay,” he says. “And then she’ll go off to the side and cater to [Jesko and Legacy] to make sure that they’re okay. It really just brings us all into unison. I feel like a coach is like a missing link for a lot of these teams to bring them into unison.”
Like any player, Phony is aiming for top spot at the ALGS Championship this weekend, and with a spot in the Winner’s Bracket secured, Guild is well on its way to fulfilling that dream. But for Phony, there’s even more on the line.
“Everyone wants to win,” he says. “No one’s here to lose. [But] my goal is not just to win, but to prove to people that I’m a good leader, that I’m able to lead basically anyone that I can as long as I’m given the respect to lead. […] And it really makes me feel like this is the LAN to win again.”
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