Piglet (''League of Legends'' player)

Chae Gwang-jin, (born February 4, 1994) better known as Piglet, is a South Korean League of Legends player who plays mid-lane for Team Liquid of the North American League of Legends Championship Series. Piglet, playing AD Carry, won the Season 3 World Championship in 2013 with LCK team SK Telecom T1.^[1][2]

With Team Liquid he finished in 3rd place both in the Spring and Summer splits of the North American League of Legends Championship Series, but once again missed the World Championship when his team was beaten by Cloud9 in the final qualifying gauntlet.

Career

2013

Before Piglet played League of Legends, he was a semi-professional player of StarCraft. His family was strongly against him becoming a pro gamer, so he lied that he quit the game. Meanwhile, he went to PC bangs to play and practice. However, he felt that he didn't play well enough and gave up the idea of being a pro. After playing League of Legends Piglet wondered if it would also have a pro scene, and when he saw people playing the game on TV his interest in becoming a pro reignited. When the South Korean servers of League of Legends opened, he began to practice more. Eventually Piglet received offers from several teams, but he decided to only contact SK Telecom T1 (SKT). In February 2013^[3] Piglet joined the newly created SK Telecom T1 #2 after successfully passing their tryout test.^[4]

Piglet and his team's playing debut was in OLYMPUS Champions Spring 2013, which put them in Group A together with CJ Entus Blaze, KT Rolster A, MVP Blue, MVP Ozone and NaJin Sword. The rookie team surprised by finishing at the top ahead of tournament favourites CJ Entus Blaze. In the quarter-finals, the team faced NaJin Shield which they swept 3–0, putting them in a semi-final against MVP Ozone.^[5] Despite being heavily favoured SKT was upset by MVP, who beat them 3–1.^[6] In the following 3rd place match SKT beat CJ Entus Frost 3–0.^[3]

Later the same month, SKT participated in the AMD-INVEN GamExperience, where they once again were knocked out in the semi-finals by MVP OZone, leading to a 3rd–4th-place finish. Shortly after, the SK Telecom T1 organization released SK Telecom T1 #1 and renamed SK Telecom T1 #2 to simply SK Telecom T1. Following this, the team competed in HOT6iX Champions Summer 2013. There they once again finished at the top of their group with a clean 3–0 record. Coming of a 3–0 win in the quarter-finals, the team found themselves once again against MVP Ozone. This time however, they beat MVP, and went on to face KT Rolster Bullets in the final. In what has been described as among the greatest series of the game's history,^[5][7] SKT defeated KT in a 3–2 reverse sweep and secured their position in the regional finals for a chance at competing in the Season 3 World Championship. There they beat KT again and thus earned Korea's final seed in the tournament.^[3][5]

At the Season 3 World Championship in Los Angeles, California, SKT only lost one game in the group stages to Chinese team OMG to tie for first place. They then swept the Taiwanese team Gamania Bears 2–0 in the quarter-finals to face off against NaJin Black Sword in the semi-finals.^[8] The best-of-five series went all the way to the fifth game before SKT could secure their spot in the final. Up against China's Royal Club, the team didn't lose a single game and were crowned the Season 3 World Champions.^[5]

2014

Piglet and SK Telecom continued their domination by winning OGN Winter undefeated. In the interview that followed, Piglet famously cried because he believed that opposing ADC 'Imp' had played better than him. Despite SK Telecom looking to go for their second consecutive win, they had plenty of issues which started when support Poohmandu stepped down and replaced with Wraith. SK Telecom struggled to get out of groups in Spring and Summer but their dominance internationally continued when they won 'All-Stars' undefeated. Poohmandu came back in Summer but most players had slumped and they lost to Najin in the regional qualifiers.

2015

Piglet was released from SKT after sister teams were disbanded, and SKT went with Bang as their starting ADC. Piglet was receiving offers from nearly every team around the world, but no Korean teams because of his infamous toxicity which was a reason why he was released from SKT. Piglet joined Team Curse, who then renamed to Team Liquid, a team renowned for only making fourth. The transfer shocked all fans as many believed he would join teams with championship victories. Hopes were high for Piglet but his little knowledge in English led to poor results and he was replaced by Keith. Team Liquid brought back Piglet after week 7 and they scraped playoffs. Team Liquid entered playoffs with little hopes but surprisingly went 3-0 against CLG, who barely missed the playoff bye. They then took a 2-0 lead against Cloud9, looking poised to make their first finals in the organisations history but were reverse-swept and played in the 3-4th place match. Team Liquid beat Team Impulse 3-2, breaking the fourth place curse.

In Summer, Team Liquid made first in the regular season and Piglet cemented himself as the best ADC in the region. They looked to finally make Worlds but they lost 3-1 against TSM in the semi-finals and then lost in the regional qualifier to a surprising Cloud9. Rumours circulated that Piglet would leave the team but he stayed.

2016

Despite rumours that he would leave, Piglet stayed on Team Liquid with Fenix but the rest of their roster looked bleak. Quas was suspended, and then kicked for behaviour issues, IWillDominate planned to retire and Xpecial was kicked from the team. This put a strain on Team Liquid and they picked up Lourlo, an NA CS top laner who looked poor on CLG Black, Smoothie, a support who seemed to have potential but was relegated on TDK and Team Liquid also picked up a full challenger team, planning to split times between them. Team Liquid played one game against Renegades, but suffered defeat, and they then announced IWillDominate was retiring and Smoothie was benched. Their replacements were Dardoch and Matt. Dardoch was a very hyped up jungler and Matt was a fairly unknown player who was known for being a Thresh and Bard player, and made challenger playing on the NA server in Hawaii with high ping. After a rough start, Team Liquid were able to bring it back to a fourth place finish with Piglet touted as the best player in North America with Huni and Reignover by fans. Team Liquid won 3-0 against NRG and many pro-players were impressed by their dominant scrims and said they could win the split. However, Team Liquid lost 3-2 to CLG, which ended with a very close game 5, decided by Darshan and Huhi double-teleporting onto the same minion, tricking Piglet into thinking it was one person. They then lost to Immortals.

In Summer, Dardoch was suspended for behaviour issues, by clashing with Locodoco and Piglet. Team Liquid went on without Dardoch, but after a poor start, Dardoch was brought back and Piglet voluntarily moved to their Challenger team. Team Liquid and Team Liquid Academy had impressive splits, but Team Liquid had a rough end to the regular season after they lost to CLG while having a 10k gold lead, which angered Dardoch as they lost their shot of making third. Team Liquid Academy made it to five games against the C9 team (who infamously put together the roster with veterans, to make a million dollars by selling the slot) but Piglet accidentally locked in Rammus and they lost the series. They then played Echo Fox but lost in game 5, ending their season without making it into the LCS.

2017

Many believed that Piglet would finally move on from Team Liquid, and have a shot at making Worlds. He was rumoured to join Korean teams, as well as recent NA LCS champions, TSM and also Worlds semi-finalist team H2k. Team Liquid recently had a influx in cash and rumours circulated that they would acquire Smeb, Reignover, Adrian and some believed they would get Pobelter. However, when the ROX Tigers lost to SKT at Worlds again, Smeb joined KT Rolster, which was put together for the sole purpose of beating SKT. Despite Team Liquid's claim that they would completely revamp the roster in order to win an LCS championship, they kept a lot of the same players and brought in Reignover, whose salary was estimated to be $2 million, and Goldenglue, who had multiple shots at making LCS but was never up to the level. Team Liquid also brought back Piglet and many believed that Goldenglue would step up and Piglet would carry. However, Team Liquid did very poorly in the regular season as Piglet looked nothing like his former self and Goldenglue continued to not look up to an acceptable standard. When IEM Katowice took place, Team Liquid decided to bench Goldenglue and put Piglet mid. Team Liquid won their first series against IMT with Piglet smashing Pobelter but they failed to meet expectations despite Piglet looking better than Goldenglue. They then brought in Doublelift, who came back after taking the split off. Doublelift was able to look good but Piglet, Matt and Reignover continued to struggle. Team Liquid placed ninth and forced to play in the promotion tournament. Team Liquid had a 2-0 lead against GCU but were nearly reverse-swept again but Piglet stepped up in Game 5 and Team Liquid made it back into the LCS.

Team Liquid did not make any roster changes for Summer split, angering fans as they were not happy with Team Liquid's poor performances from Reignover, Goldenglue, Piglet or Matt.

Tournament results

2013
Date	Event	Placing	Final game
2013-06-05	OLYMPUS Champions Spring 2013	3rd	SK Telecom T1 #2	0	CJ Entus Frost
2013-06-29	AMD-INVEN GamExperience	SF	SK Telecom T1 #2	0-2	MVP Ozone
2013-08-31	HOT6iX Champions Summer 2013	1st	SK Telecom T1	3-2	KT Rolster Bullets
2013-10-04	Season 3 World Championship	1st	SK Telecom T1	3-2	Royal Club

2014
Date	Event	Placing	Final game
2014-01-25	PANDORA.TV Champions Winter 2013–2014	1st SF	SK Telecom T1 K	3-1	Samsung Galaxy Ozone
2014-05-11	All-Star Paris 2014 Invitational	1st	SK Telecom T1 K	3-0	OMG
2014-05-14	bigfile NLB Spring 2014	3rd	SK Telecom T1 K	3-0	KT Rolster Bullets
2014-06-18	SK Telecom LTE-A LoL Masters 2014	2nd	SK Telecom T1	0-3	Samsung Galaxy
2014-08-09	ITENJOY NLB Summer 2014	1st	SK Telecom T1 K	3-0	NaJin Black Sword

2015
Date	Event	Placing	Final game
2015-04-18	2015 NA LCS Spring	3rd	Team Liquid	3-2	Team Impulse
2015-08-22	2015 NA LCS Summer	3=	Team Liquid	3-1	Team Impulse
	2016 NA LCS Spring	?	Team Liquid
	2015 NA LCS Spring playoffs	?	Team Liquid
	2016 NA LCS Summer	5th	Team Liquid
	2015 NA LCS Summer playoffs	?	Team Liquid

Individual awards

References