Can MiBR Compete With FURIA To Become The Best In Brazil?
Founded in 2003, MiBR was built to compete with the best in Brazil. To do this, they funded a successful roster early into their season and even placed third at a Major in their comeback year. Over the past three years, MiBR has earned almost 1.5 million dollars and most importantly earned respect from their peers. In 2019, they made another Major appearance after crushing it in S-Tier Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS:GO). Fans of competitive CS:GO are often divided between MiBR and FURIA, and this is most likely due to the fact that these two teams used to be top competitors. In 2018, MiBR was ranked first in Brazil - but later fell off.
THE MiBR COMEBACK
MiBR's explosive start took place in 2018 - the year they earned around five hundred thousand dollars and placed third at the FACEIT Major in London. On top of that, they were Zotac Cup Champions and placed second at the ECS Season 6 finals. With a mixture of ex-SK Gaming members and North American pub stompers, MiBR had a roster that everyone loved to watch. Seeing two communities come together and dominate CS:GO was an amazing view. Fast forward to the final months of their 2018 season, and MiBR finished off the year with a fourth-place finish at the ESL Pro League finals. For the cherry on top, they were also considered the number one team in Brazil.
At the start of their 2019 season, the Brazilian legends had a Major to play at. After finding success in their previous season, MiBR was expected to stand on the podium at IEM Katowice. The only org standing in their way was Astralis. They went 3-1 on stage, and were later eliminated in the semi-finals and placed fourth. After losing Marcelo “coldzera” David and Tarik ‘tarik” Celik, MiBR started to transfer a few smaller players. That didn’t stop them from earning a fair share of tournament prizes, but their rank in Brazil was taken by FURIA, putting the team in second place right behind their main opponents.
TOUGH BEGINNINGS
Now for 2020, which has been a bittersweet year for MiBR. Due to frustration within the team, three star players were asked to move away from the active roster. This included Fernando “fer” Alvarenga, Epitácio “TACO” Pessoa de Melo Filho, and Gabriel “FalleN” Toledo de Alcântara Sguario. A few months before this happened, the original roster had placed second at Flashpoint Season 1 earning a quarter of a million dollars - one of the biggest achievements for MiBR. After that, their performance started to sink, resulting in some weak overall placements. The team still managed to place first at BLAST Premier Spring, but that wasn’t enough to hold players together.
With hopes to rebuild their team to ignore disqualification in upcoming events, MiBR signed Lucas “LUCAS1” Teles. To make sure they had a full roster without locking in full-time contracts, they also acquired two players on loan. Leonardo “leo_drk” de Oliveira Carlos was loaned from Sharks Esports and Vinicius “v$m” Moreira joined from DETONA Gaming. Due to roster changes, MiBR didn’t compete throughout October. Instead, they spent time training their new team for BLAST Premier Fall. They lost to Astralis with the arrival of Andrea “Xyp9x” Højsleth but beat FURIA in a 2-1 set. Not a bad start for the new roster.
Click to enlargeARRIVAL OF NEW PLAYERS
While LUCAS1 was the only signed player of the three pickups, he’s had the weakest performance so far compared to leo_drk and v$m. After two sets against Astralis and FURIA, LUCAS1 has a 0.97 player rating with no highlights, whereas leo_drk had a 1.02 player rating and v$m has a 0.95 player rating. Despite v$m having a lower overall than LUCAS1, he also clutched twice in 1v2 situations - a negative 0.02 rating doesn’t compare to the carry he put in against FURIA. As for leo_drk, not only did he have the highest overall rating, but he also managed to clutch a round against FURIA. MiBR is definitely getting their money’s worth from these loaned players.
Even though MiBR has earned more money than FURIA, they’ve also had the chance to participate at Flashpoint Season 1, since they’re founding members. FURIA has had a consistent year and peaked at third back in October. Now that shouldn’t take away from the potential that MiBR has for 2021, since sixty percent of their roster chose to ride the bench, MiBR was put in a tough situation. Next year they’ll have a chance to rebuild using their new team of loaned players or find a solution for their veteran team. More information can be determined after BLAST Premier Fall.
So far things are looking good with these additions. MiBR now has room to breathe and format a strategy for future events. Compared to FURIA, MiBR is looking like a pretty convincing competitor for the near future.
Images via MiBR
