We promised to win the championship together, so why did you all retire?

Who is Effort?

Judging solely from his achievements, he doesn't seem to have anything particularly noteworthy to show for himself in the world championships.

But at least he won the LCK league championship.

In today's transfer market, Effort is one of the few support players who can attract competition from clubs.

Keria, the jungler for LSB and the support for T1.

There's also Corejj, who plays in Europe and America, and Hang, a rookie support player from the LPL.

They were named by South Korean media as the five most eye-catching players in the transfer market at the end of 2021.

Some people might ask:

No, where's TheShy?

—Because TheShy was still negotiating his contract renewal when this was being scheduled.

At the time, it was widely believed that he would renew his contract with IG.

So there was no sorting at all.

However, among the five players, only LSB jungler and Effort's contracts are questionable.

Hang will definitely not be released.

The same applies to keria.

Unless T1 is insane, they would never let Keria go.

Corejj is already a landmark figure in the European and American regions.

The main reason kkoma recommended Effort is because he has a very good relationship with Effort.

Effort debuted with T1, where Kkoma was the manager and had high hopes for him.

There's a persistent rumor in the LCK that he's the "successor to Wolf."

And he really played very well.

It wasn't just Kkoma who valued him; his teammates who played with him back then did too.

Even a picky AD carry like Bang has publicly praised Effort for being very smart and talented.

Faker also believes that Effort is a good fit for the team and can keep up with his thinking.

If nothing unexpected happens.

Effort will most likely play for T1 until he retires.

But generally speaking, if we say "nothing unexpected happens," then something unexpected is bound to happen.

In 2020, Effort accidentally leaked T1's team chat during a live stream, leading to the disclosure of information about potential coach LS joining the team.

This directly or indirectly led to Effort being dropped by T1 and eventually leaving the team.

This year, he is playing for LSB.

But Effort's contract is about to end after only one year.

LSB has absolutely no intention of renewing its contract with Effort.

This has led to him being single for the time being.

As someone who once had high hopes for Effort, kkoma still maintains a good relationship with him.

A while ago, Effort called him and said that the Nongshim team had extended an invitation to him, but he was still hesitant.

Because NS wasn't very interested in him, and the price they offered was only at the lower-middle level of LCK.

That's why kkoma recommended Effort to Chen Ye.

To be honest, the base salary in the LPL is incomparable to that in the LCK.

Nowadays, the highest salary for a support player in the LCK is six or seven million a year, which is already quite extravagant.

And what about the top salary in the LPL?

It's Crisp, formerly the support player for FPX.

His contract is already worth over ten million a year.

The difference is that big.

The salaries of mid-to-lower tier support players in the LPL are around two to three million yuan per year.

And what about the lower-ranked teams in the LCK?

If it reaches a few hundred thousand, that would be considered a sign of the club's attention.

Listening to Kkoma's introduction, Chen Ye nodded secretly.

Effort isn't particularly old.

He is also a seasoned and experienced support player.

Most importantly, he is an LCK player.

It's definitely good value for money for LPL teams.

However, he obviously couldn't contact Effort based solely on kkoma's account.

He planned to have Kkoma help make contact while he also investigated Effort more thoroughly.

kkoma also expressed his understanding.

This is definitely not a decision that can be made by just two people talking.

However, at this point, the chubby coach, who had been silent all along, sighed and couldn't help but speak up:

"If only it had been sooner."

"If we can beat Lehends before GenG, maybe we can make it to the World Championship."

World Championship?

Chen Ye's expression was a mixture of confusion and surprise.

Chen Ye now has a good understanding of the major tournaments and knows that they are the highest stage for League of Legends competitions.

It's held once a year, and each official competition area only has a maximum of three to four tickets.

It represents the highest level of professional competition.

According to this assistant coach...

Doesn't that mean Lehends can secure a spot in the World Championship?

That's a bit of an exaggeration!

But to his surprise...

Faced with such praise, the other two coaches nodded in unison.

He looked completely convinced.

"With our roster, we certainly have a great chance."

"If it's him... then it doesn't seem like an overstatement."

Even though some talented athletes haven't achieved much yet, no one can ignore their brilliance.

The true masters.

For example, Knight, and Chovy.

The same applies to Lehends.

In an official LCK variety show in 2022.

When discussing the coaches' ideal lineups, when it came to support players, five out of twelve coaches selected Beryl for the first team, and four selected Keria.

The remaining three were all chosen by Lehends, who had not yet achieved much success at the time.

Not only that, but the others who didn't pick Lehends also put him in the second or third team.

It's easy to see how highly regarded this contestant is.

Now, Chen Ye also feels a bit sorry for himself, as they say.

Everyone has their own opinion on who the best player is.

But a player that all three coaches think is good must be pretty good.

He didn't say anything more, gave the instructions, and then watched the coach leave.

Kkoma is very efficient.

Or rather... Effort himself was also in a hurry.

After all, he wasn't Keria, whom T1 saw as the future core of the team.

It's not Beryl, who has already achieved great success.

They didn't even receive the same level of attention as Lehends, who were highly sought after by various teams.

He just wanted a decent salary.

LPL = rich.

They're much richer than those poor clubs in the lower-tier LCK.

RG has confirmed that Effort does indeed meet their current requirements.

After the two sides made contact, Chen Ye immediately decided to lead his team to fly to South Korea the next day.

Get this done quickly.

On the other hand, he also began to send people to secretly contact youth training talents or players from secondary leagues of various clubs.

Mountains don't move, but water does.

To be fair, this thing isn't actually against the rules right now.

The winter and summer transfer windows each year are among the few times when players can openly and legitimately contact other clubs.

Even if the club found out, it wouldn't make a difference, and they couldn't stop it.

After all, once the player contracts are renewed, the players are no longer entirely puppets of the club.

This is really thanks to Kanavi.

If it weren't for you, Navi, eating leftovers every day in GRF and then spending several years as a slave in LPL.

That would have prevented the GRF contract incident from causing such a major collapse later on.

It is even less likely to lead to the renewal of the players' contracts.

Why don't you hurry up and thank Navi?

The short but intense few days passed quickly.

RG Club has also quietly announced the addition of two players.

There's not much to say about this; Effort was a free agent to begin with.

Their past performance was acceptable, so this can be considered a decent signing.

And the other one...

That's a bit tricky.

Welcome Xun to RG Esports Club

To the average viewer, this news was unremarkable.

Xun?

Who is Gouba?

Most viewers simply don't care about the second division.

I just assumed RG had randomly picked a jungler.

But in the eyes of the major clubs...

This matter has taken a bit of a turn.

Then, an intriguing Weibo post came from IG manager Guokui.

This directly triggered the second massive wave of this transfer window!