OpTic yay responds after shroud doubts org’s future in Valorant

Valorant pro Jaccob ‘yay’ Whiteake has hit back at shroud after he cast his doubts on OpTic’s future in Valorant after 2023 franchising.

We’re now just a short while out until we learn what teams will be joining Riot’s partnership for the 2023 Valorant Champions Tour.

It’s expected that only eight to ten teams will be accepted into the Americas league for the 2023 season, leaving much uncertainty to the over 150 North American organizations alone that applied for partnership.

It’s understood that no organizations have yet been notified whether or not they’ve made it into the partnership. Regardless, cryptic tweets from OpTic yay and Chet have led shroud and Tarik to debate whether or not the organization has a future in Valorant.

Just a short while ago on August 23, a tweet from yay stating there are “interesting times ahead after champions” left fans feeling uncertain about the organization’s future. At the same time, the team’s coach Chet also put out a rather vague tweet.

Despite OpTic already making their mark in Valorant, taking home the Masters 1 trophy this year and putting in great performances at other events, shroud speculated that the tweets could mean they didn’t make it into franchising.

“I don’t know what it means. I don’t know if there’s drama amongst the team or if they didn’t make franchising. I don’t know which one it is,” shroud said during his Champions watch party.

The Sentinels pro then noted that a player on OpTic’s roster was previously involved with Counter-Strike match-fixing allegations, which could be causing the organization issues trying to join Riot’s partnership.

“Wait, didn’t one of the teammates on OpTic have allegations for throwing? I don’t remember who but I swear someone does,” shroud noted, referring to Jimmy “Marved” Nguyen being named among many players suspected of match-fixing in CSGO.

However, Tarik argued that Marved’s controversial past wouldn’t be as big of an issue as shroud thinks, especially when considering that it is just allegations that have been made.

The Twitch star also added that he’d be surprised if OpTic didn’t get into the franchise, and if they were denied due to Marved’s allegations they’d make the roster changes needed to join.

Speculations were then shut down as yay claimed his cryptic tweet was a meme and questioned those looking for a deeper meaning in them. “my tweet was a meme, why people looking so deep,” he wrote.

Riot is expected to notify teams on whether or not they’ve made it into the partnership before the end of Champions 2022, which is set to end on September 18.

It’s unclear whether or not we’ll see teams announce their status on whether or not they made it into the franchise. Hopefully, we’ll be seeing OpTic among the teams accepted.