On February 17, Turkish Professional League of Legends team 5Ronin announced that they terminated their top lane player Onurcan “Oncan” Atak‘s contract.
Here is the statement of 5Ronin’s manager Vezni “Vez” Tönissen, regarding the changes in the team:
I read the messages about the changes we made to the team. All I can say is the decision we made was not about performance. We do not give up on any of our players easily, but sometimes we have to make difficult decisions.
We tried to solve the communication problems of Oncan with the rest of the team in the past weeks, but unfortunately we were not successful. Instead of transferring him to the b-team, we decided to part our ways.
I would like to point out; the performance degradation of the team is temporary. We can overcome this, but if team cohesion cannot be achieved, this is not a situation we can ignore.
I would like to point out that management team does not make sensitive decisions that directly affect team performance, communication, players and coaches without listening to other people. We prefer to consult with players and coaches on these issues, to receive feedback and to make decisions after objectively observing.
Vezni “Vez” Tönissen
Oncan first went into reserve and then played in the b-team of 5 Ronin organization. He had his former position back after another member quit but was “kicked out” shortly after.
Onurcan “Oncan” Atak’s Statement
On Twitter, Onurcan “Oncan” Atak explained his side of things. Here is his statement:
I decided to give a statement about my departure from 5ronin and what happened according to my point of view.
While with this team, it started off as a new experience for me compared to last split. There were 2 Korean imports which should mean only good things, because we’ve seen countless TCL champions in the past involve at least 1 or more Korean imports. Soon I started to realize however that this caused an unhealthy power dynamic within the team. Because the two imports started giving coaching advice to the Turkish players after every scrim. At first this seemed like a blessing, but later on I realized that when I disagreed with them on something they told me to do, that it meant I was being disrespectful, basically implying that they are always correct and that I NEED to listen to their coaching. This is how it felt from my experience within the team. They are giving valuable information at times, no doubt, but at other times they are giving me wrong information from the way I saw it. Sometimes I would play lulu top and use ult and shield on broccoli while he is fighting but he flashes away from me and I tell him that he can survive without using flash and coach Ili agrees with me, but he laughs and says “no I REALLY can’t” as he laughs and walk away, almost in a “who does this guy think he is, giving me advice. I am much better than him.” type of manner. And this continued. Whenever I tried to point out their mistakes I could see their mood change. They would become frustrated and offended. Because of this, I started becoming reluctant to continue pointing out their mistakes because I felt like it would only worsen the team’s bond and environment. And from my experience this behavior continued throughout the point of writing this. I felt that I could never tell them about their mistakes without being laughed at or mocked but they wouldn’t stop about my mistakes during every scrim in between games, and I was forced to listen or I would be called stubborn and disrespectful. It is to my understanding that I have been stubborn during past splits even with supermassive academy, and this is something I tried working on during this split and will continue doing so after my departure. However this situation with Korean imports who think they are always right is unfair for me to handle.
Throughout going 0-2 and then losing against Fenerbahçe in the second week. I started becoming frustrated of how much the Korean imports are making mistakes themselves, but continue to point out the mistakes of the Turkish players instead of focusing on themselves. During this time I decided that I don’t care anymore and it’s time that I start pointing out their mistakes so they can improve during the reviews. I get contacted the next day by management that the Koreans don’t want to work with me because I’m disrespectful and stubborn and that they unfortunately have to let me go. I was shocked but I expected it already deep down because I could tell by how passive-aggressive the Koreans were acting to me beforehand as they were laughing at the points I made during the reviews in a disrespectful and mocking manner. I knew however that the problem wasn’t me, so I was confident that the team would want me back after a week or two. So I went to play in academy for a while (by the way I love every one of the academy players and think they are all talented and have a lot of potential). But fast forward and the team goes 0-2 and I start to ask to management and Ili: ”what needs to be done for me to go back to the main team?.” Because I am sacrificing a lot of my time by going to Turkey and skipping my university studies. I told them with honesty: ”I came to play in TCL and not in academy.” They explain to me that the review stuff with talking back and forth with broCColi needs to stop because it’s taking too much time. I tell them I will not talk to him and just note down the critique he gives me and work on it silently. They are happy to hear this and I start playing scrims again with the main team but I’m sharing time with Skewer so I’m playing 50/50 right now. In academy scrims and main team scrims. So I ask them curiously, why is skewer better than me at certain times, shouldn’t I just play every game? And they explain how I need to fix my soloq and my champion pool. So I start playing 8 games a day with the 5 game scrim-blocks and watching streams or vods of pro players excluded. During this I explain to them that I can already play the traditional “weakside” champs like Gnar, Volibear and Ornn, and that we just didn’t try it before. So the week follows and we try playing those champions in scrims and it is successful. And so Ili decides before official games if I am playing or skewer. The decision was that I would play against Nasr, and after that game finished I was told that I would also play against Wildcats. Before and during the games I am thinking of how if I play bad that I won’t get to play for the main team anymore. And this is an extremely unhealthy mindset and it was draining me. Therefore I didn’t play perfect or close to how I played in scrims. Eventually it became too much for me and the team to handle. I wanted things to change but the team was getting tired of my requests, and we parted ways. What once was a team I thought was a family turned into an unhealthy environment for me that won’t give me the time to grow and the freedom to point out my thoughts about the game.
I want to end on a positive note because besides these issues these are one of the most amazing people I’ve met. I think Ili is a great coach with good game sense and outside of the game understanding and supportiveness. Vez is a kind and funny manager that tries his best to help every player. And Sefa is amazing, empathic and one of the most understanding people I have ever met. I love Brolia and Umut, they were great teammates from last split to now. And I wish the best of luck to the new players and wish them a good career.
For now I will move back to the Netherlands and focus on self-reflecting, soloq and spending time with my family. Have a good day everyone.
Onurcan “Oncan” Atak
Summary
Oncan explained that there were problems mainly due to Korean players. Korean players coached Turkish players and ignored their own mistakes. They thought Oncan was stubborn and did not want their “advice”. Oncan said that he did his best to stay in the team, but a solution could not be found. The player announced that he will now return to the Netherlands, spend time with his family and work towards correcting some of his mistakes.
