PGL Disqualifies Winners of Closed Qualifiers Due to Chat Joke
Author: Hawk Live LLC
Last updated:
PGL, the tournament organizer responsible for the Dota Pro Circuit 2023 in North America, has made the decision to disqualify American goons, the winners of the closed qualifiers. The disqualification comes as a result of suspected involvement in match-fixing activities.
PGL:
Team American goons is disqualified from NA closed qualifiers for breaking the following rule:
Bets and match-fixing
Players, managers, and coaches are prohibited from making any kind of bets on these tournament matches. If it is proven that a player/coach/manager had made a bet or had purposely tried to achieve a certain result in a game, then the team will be punished up to disqualification and banned from future PGL events.
Specifically for
If it is proven that a player/coach/manager had purposely tried to achieve a certain result in a game, then the team will be punished up to disqualification.
As a result, Team GateKept will take the last spot for Division 2 in this tour.
American Goons have been disqualified from DPC NA 2023 Tour 3: Division II and replaced by the team that placed third in the Closed Qualifiers - GateKept.
As it was soon discovered, the reason behind this decision was a screenshot of a Steam chat conversation among the participants. After losing to American Goons in the finals of the closed qualifiers, Kobey «Napkin» Eimers from GateKept asked Jose «esK» Coronel if they had intentionally thrown the match against GRIN Esports in the upper bracket finals. To which esK decided to make a joke at the expense of the losers and replied with a "yes."
Napkin's decision to capture and share a screenshot ultimately led to PGL disqualifying American Goons from the tournament, without conducting a thorough investigation or clarifying the details. As a result, GateKept took the place of American Goons in the DPC.
The Dota 2 community reacted stronglyto PGL's swift and unsupported decision, expressing their outrage and siding with American Goons.
Kurtis «Aui_2000» Ling (Tundra Esports coach):
I watched both AG vs Grin games and it's pretty clear AG were playing to win (smoking around, looking for picks, playing with buybacks for base defense etc). I don't know if there's more evidence than two screenshots of clear jokes between AG and GateKept but this makes no sense.
Peter «ppd» Dager:
Hey, it's not too late to fix this. Please reconsider this uninformed decision.
Slow down PGL... the team who lost messaged the team who crushed them a salty loser message. The winning team replied with 'ye' so you banned them from the league and accused them of match-fixing? Fix this, please!
David «MoonMeander» Tan (TSM coach):
I trust that PGL will do the right thing and reverse this ban, lil nick and Boris are stand up NADota players who deserve more than this ending.
Quinn «Quinn» Callahan (Gaimin Gladiators player):
Lil nicks team getting disqualified is COMPLETELY insane and ridiculous. This not being reverted would be one of the worst TO decisions of all time. Unreal
Even the opponents and winners of the Closed Qualifiers, GRIN Esports, took the side of American Goons:
We do not think that this is the most informed. Some players on GateKept have a personal vendetta on our team, stating we can’t compete like we did not beat a Div1 team in official match a few weeks ago. We understand the evidence and lend our support to American Goons.
The integrity of our accomplishment has been tainted, regardless of truth. Looking forward to the days we can prove our deserving of winning the qualifiers. Bring on the DPC
Members of the American Goons team have not yet commented on the situation.
