Liquid's JT: "Almost Every Team Will Have To Play Low-Level Events"
![Liquid's JT: "Almost Every Team Will Have To Play Low-Level Events"](https://www.gambling.com/cdn-cgi/image/w=1200,h=675,format=auto,fit=crop/https://objects.kaxmedia.com/genesis/esports-player-1200x630.png?v=e5dac933bf9895c6aae8f3c526507d0d211a26bc "Liquid's JT: "Almost Every Team Will Have To Play Low-Level Events"")
Team Liquid in-game leader Johnny "JT" Theodosiou says the way the Counter-Strike 2 ranking system now works means almost every team, outside the very top of the standings, has to play smaller LAN tournaments alongside S-tier events just to protect their position.
JT made the comments to Dust2.us after Liquid won the iBUYPOWER Masters, part of fl0m's Mythical LAN 2026, over the weekend, the team's first LAN trophy in seven years.
Why Smaller Events Now Matter
"The way that the ecosystem is now, especially with how the points work, is that almost every team is going to have to play low-level tournaments and also S-tier tournaments if they're invited," JT said.
"The only teams really that can avoid playing them at all is the top eight, top ten in the VRS because it's just too risky to only rely on the small number of S-tier events that you attend."
He added that most S-tier events are attended by the same twelve teams, meaning lower-ranked sides increasingly show up at smaller LANs to top up their ranking points, a pattern he said is visible in the maxed-out LAN attendance totals among teams ranked in the top 20 and top 30.
A Trophy Liquid Hadn't Needed Before
JT said Liquid historically avoided these smaller LANs, but called the win over Wildcard in the final "a pretty easy game" and credited Mario "malbsMd" Samayoa, who he said carried much of the tournament alongside Jonathan "EliGE" Jablonowski.
"The real goal is to win a bigger trophy than this," JT said, "but I'm happy that we're still playing well, we're having some consistency going, and I just hope that we keep it up."
Building Malbsmd's Role Around His Strengths
Asked about malbsMd's strong tournament, JT said the coaching staff had not changed much about his individual game beyond leaning into his strengths as an anchor, particularly on Inferno, where he said "everyone can see that he plays really well."
MalbsMd is used mostly as an entry fragger on the T-side and an anchor on the CT-side, with some flexibility built in depending on the map.
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What It Means For Liquid's Season
Liquid's willingness to grind smaller LANs for ranking points, rather than relying solely on S-tier invites, reflects a broader shift at the top of Counter-Strike, as teams chase consistency in a ranking system that now rewards volume as well as peak results.
For bettors tracking Liquid's form heading into the next wave of S-tier qualification, JT's comments suggest the team plans to keep showing up at smaller events rather than resting on its Mythical LAN win.
The trophy was Liquid's first at any LAN in seven years, a gap that makes the team's return to smaller-event competition as much a confidence exercise as a points exercise heading into the next major qualification window.
By JT's own account, the approach is becoming the norm rather than the exception across the tier just below the fixed top eight to ten teams in the VRS rankings.
