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JOJOPYUN becomes centerpiece of BIDDING WAR in off-season
Canadian Mid Laner Joseph Joon “jojopyun” Pyun has become the centerpiece for a fierce bidding war between two organizations. It was initially reported on November 3rd that jojopyun had reached a verbal agreement with Cloud9. This was after negotiations involving multiple LCS teams for the 2024 season. However, LCK organization, Liiv SANDBOX, then entered with a late bid for the Canadian laner.
Having spent the vast majority of his career with Evil Geniuses, he gained notoriety in 2022. This was due to his victory in the LCS, being the youngest player ever to win the LCS at 17 years old (and 6 months).
Plenty of Suitors
Despite the near confirmation of jojopyun to Cloud9, the move was largely considered successful due to the limited options that the player had heading into the 2024 season. While he had received plenty of offers, from both LCS and LEC organizations, many of them were not extremely viable for a candidate as promising as he was.
The young prodigy has initially received interest from Team Vitality and Team Heretics prior to the start of Worlds 2023. However, jojopyun ultimately decided to remain in North America (announced late October/early November).
That was when a bidding war began among some of NA’s top organizations. FlyQuest, Cloud9, and Golden Guardians were the three main suitors for his hand. Unfortunately, Golden Guardians had to halt off-season spending and ended their pursuit for jojoypun as a consequence.
This left Cloud9 and FlyQuest as the two main choices at the time. Cloud9 was the more obvious choice, thus jojopyun elected to go with them.
Cloud9 has had an extremely good year in 2023. Both LCS regular seasons and Spring Playoffs - won. 2nd place in the LCS 2023 Championship. 10th Worlds appearance for the organization. To the 19-year-old who won LCS 2023 Summer MVP, this seemed like a match made in heaven.
Korea Enters
Verbal confirmation is not a signed contract, as Cloud9 found to their frustration when Liiv SANDBOX entered the chat. Few could fault jojopyun for being tempted to break his verbal agreement when there was an opportunity on the table for a historic move to the LCK.
While transfers from the LCS to the LCK have occurred before, this move would have been the first-of-its-kind. No native North American talent has ever become a starter for the LCK.
In any case, despite Liiv SANDBOX submitting a substantial offer of their own for the player, Cloud9 emerged victorious in the negotiations as they revised and increased their initial offer.
Jojopyun is officially set to be a starter for the Cloud9’s League of Legends roster in 2024.
Credit: Colin Young-Wolff/Riot Games
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