Sean Gares explains why yay joining Disguised makes “total sense”

Valorant content creator and former 100 Thieves coach Sean Gares has shared his thoughts on Jaccob ‘yay’ Whiteaker’s decision to join Disguised and argued why the move is a logical one for ‘El Diablo’.

After over two years competing at the highest level, achieving team success and individual accolades, yay has taken a step back by joining Disguised in the Challengers league, the second tier of North American Valorant.

The move came after yay and Cloud9 decided to part ways less than six months into his contract. He attended just two events with the team before they decided to go in a different direction, citing “role issues”.

On his stream, yay said that his Disguised tenure “might be a short-term thing” as he is set on playing at a top level again. For Disguised to secure promotion to the VCT Americas league, they will have to finish top two in the Challengers league playoffs and then win the Americas Ascension tournament, featuring six teams from North America, Brazil and LATAM.

Sean Gares on why Disguised yay makes total sense

During a live stream, Sean Gares admitted that, at a first glance, having a player of yay’s caliber in a tier-two league “is actually insane”. But looking at the current state of affairs in VCT Americas and the fact that the transfer window is closed until the end of the season, he saw the logic behind the move.

“That’s actually crazy, but it makes total sense when you think about the roster lock and some of the problems he might be facing right now,” he said. “We talked about it a while back.

“You have 100 Thieves, Cloud9, NRG, EG and Sentinels. Where is yay going to go? They [100 Thieves] just picked up Cryo. He just came from here [Cloud9]. They [NRG] picked up ardiis in his place. Sentinels have TenZ, zekken… Marved is already their sixth, so he’s not going there.

“That essentially just leaves EG until the season is over and teams make roster changes.”

yay will make his Disguised debut on April 20 against Oxygen Esports in the NA Challengers league. Disguised have been placed in Group A, along with M80, TSM, Oxygen, Turtle Troop and Shopify Rebellion.