MPKBK: “I have one major flaw—I’m too kind to be a manager”

Yeah, I remember it well. That was when Source was on its last legs—probably around 2011, something like that. Back in 2011, we hadn’t even heard anything about CS:GO yet. I mean, Valve didn’t start teasing that a new CS was coming until 2012. And back then in the CIS, Dota was the only thing popular in esports. It was the Dota universe in Russia and throughout the CIS. Both CS 1.6 and Source were dying off terribly. I remember it clearly—I can even list the people by their nicknames who made a name for themselves that year. They were talented guys, on par with FL4MUS. They showed up, made a splash at a couple of LAN events. We were like, “Oh, man, you’ve got to play.” But there was no money, no organization. He sat there, took a look at it, and was like, “Nope, guys, this isn’t my thing—I’m going to college to study.” Yeah, those were tough times for CS.

I went back to my home club, MGZ. It was a club with maybe 30 computers total that could run Source back then. And I started organizing small tournaments with an entry fee. So, 2,000 rubles per team, and the total prize pool came out to about 10,000 rubles. That’s it—let’s play, guys. I think we had to run one-day tournaments back then. ...> This was the club where I used to play as a player. I had a good relationship with the owner, and he let me come in to help organize things.

I realize I have one major flaw—I’m too kind to be a manager. I’ve talked to a lot of people, and I understand that a manager needs to be involved in making substitutions and scouting new players. You have to directly assist the coach in these areas. But I’m like this—I trust the captain, I trust the coach, and my own perspective gets clouded by that. I believe in a person completely; I can give someone a year to prove themselves, thinking, “He’ll take off, he’ll take off.” That’s not how a manager should work. So in that sense, I’m not the right fit. When it comes to the practical details—like finding them a place to stay or buying them tickets to travel abroad—it’s all very similar to organizing a tournament. It’s just scaled a little differently there.