When it comes to biggest upsets in CS GO, There's always one name that comes to everybody's minds and that Braxton "swag" Pierce. On the 26th of January, following rumors that in a match vs NetcodeGuides.com had the result fixed by the then-iBUYPOWER roster, swag was banned from all Valve-sponsored events. He was 19 Years Old at that time and showed such a great potential that even legends of cs go at that time titled him the biggest upset in North-American cs go history.
The Beginning
Swag's first major appearance in CS:GO was being part of Team Dynamic during Season 12 of ESEA. From there, he joined compLexity, which competed at ESL One Katowice 2014, as well as multiple ESEA seasons.
Later, he was acquired by iBUYPOWER in exchange for Todd anger William .iBUYPOWER were widely considered during this time to be the best North American side. During his time on the team, they reached the FACEIT League - Season 2 finals, after beating then-Team LDLC.com (now Team EnVyUs), before suffering a loss to fnatic.
After their successes, the iBUYPOWER roster changed massively, with swag remaining unchanged throughout. On the 5th of January, he and his fellow teammates left the iBUYPOWER organisation and founded GX. They were widely expected to be secured by Evil Geniuses.
Everything Seems Perfect WHEN!
On the 26th of January, following rumors that a CEVO Season 5 match vs NetcodeGuides.com had the result fixed by the then-iBUYPOWER roster, swag was banned alongside 6 other people from all Valve-sponsored events.On the 24th of July in 2017, swag and former members of IBP were unbanned by ESL, allowing them to compete in ESL sponsored events.
Though evidence surfaced immediately indicating that the match had been fixed,the story was dismissed as rumor and blew over until a follow-up article was published on January 16, 2015 by the original journalist, Richard Lewis. In it, he reveals various pieces of leaked evidence directly implicating multiple members of the IBP team as having bet against themselves and then deliberately losing the match.Lewis and Courtney Timpson, a CS:GO Lounge employee, were able to identify a large number of unusually high volume bets by Duc “cud” Pham and dboorN, who were connected to members of the iBP team. The article was confirmed by ShahZaM, who had been advised by Netcodeguides.com founder Casey Foster that the match would be thrown and had also placed a bet against the team. Foster's site was a joint venture between himself and DaZeD, captain of the throwing iBP team; the likely motivation for the fix.
On January 26, 2015, Valve released a commentary on the incident, Integrity and Fair Play,which announced the indefinite bans of four of the iBP players in addition to the orchestrators of the fix. Skadoodle was the lone iBP player left unbanned, as he had declined to share in the profit from the throw. Valve was able to confirm details in the article by Lewis through inspection of inventories and transactions, noting that many high value items won during bets were transferred through to the banned individuals. In all, seven individuals were indefinitely banned from participation in any capacity in Valve-sponsored events.
Joined Cloud9 ?
Brax later soon joined Cloud9 as a streamer and analyst for the team who doesn't want to let his talents be go through waste and helped him stay active in game while he was banned for 3+ years.
He even played as a stand-in in RGN PRO SERIES 2015 winning the $15,000 tournament.
Unban And Return Of A Fan-Favourite?
Due to the uproar in community and trending #FREESWAG and #FREEIBP and On August 31, 2015, Richard Lewis published an open letter to Valve on Daily Dot, in which he condemned Valve for leaving the players in a state of uncertainty regarding the future of their careers due to the "indefinite" nature of the bans. CEVO responded later on in the day by loosening the bans to only restricting them from playing in their league.
Later On 24th of July in 2017, swag and former members of IBP were unbanned by ESL, allowing them to compete in ESL sponsored events. On the 6th of September in 2017, swag and former members of iBUYPOWER were unbanned by DreamHack, allowing them to compete in DreamHack, including Open and Masters events.
Later On Sam "DaZeD" Marine said that he will reunite with former iBP teammates Braxton "swag" Pierce and Keven "AZK" Lariviere, with Michael "dapr" Gulino, formerly of Denial, and Matt "Pollo" Wilson, who has played for teams like Eanix and RONIN in the past, rounding out the roster for MDL 2017 as GX.
Later On Sam "DaZeD" Marine end up leaving stating,"I'm gonna step down from playing competitively, i told the guys to get a new player for me. I just don't have the motivation or drive"
FUTURE?
As swag is still only 21 Year Old and still pretty impressive in the game the future seems bright for him but i personally thinks that under the wing of GX it seems like a harder job than expected.
But sure he will make it happen.
Just until he don't give up!
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