Journey to the top: Team Mayhem’s Cartels, JesusSaves, and KBR talk Call of Duty: Mobile esports

The Call of Duty: Mobile (CoD Mobile) World Championship 2023 event is taking place at DreamHack Atlanta! Ahead of the competition, we sat down with Team Mayhem's Cartels, Victor "KBR" Coletto, and Adam "JesusSaves" Khreis for an exclusive interview about their CoD Mobile esports strategy, teamwork, and more!

What does it take to assemble a team of star players? And how does it all start? For Cartels, who is the people's MVP, his story began with playing Call of Duty on the PS4. However, he shifted to mobile games due to financial reasons. This led to PUBG Mobile and later CoD Mobile in 2021.

Team Mayhem coach KBR was also originally a console player. Back in 2010, he played a lot of Call of Duty: Black Ops. This brought him into the pro scene in Brazil. When 2018 came about, he became a coach for a Brazilian team. After getting recognized for his skills through a video, he took that coaching experience and transitioned to CoD Mobile in 2022.

As for in-game leader (IGL) JesusSaves, he actually quit gaming, but returned to the franchise through CoD Mobile in 2019 for the nostalgia. This led to forming a competitive team and playing in multiple tournaments. His goal is to take home the gold in the Stage 5 of the Snapdragon Pro Series' competitive CoD Mobile circuit. This stage is also known as the 2023 CoD Mobile World Championship.

This year, Team Mayhem is among the best of the best when it comes to CoD Mobile esports. At DreamHack Atlanta, they're up against teams such as Luminosity, Tribe Gaming, Team Vitality, and more. Team Mayhem players earned their spot in this stage throughout 2023, and Cartels, KBR, and JesusSaves told esports.gg about their top moments in the circuit so far.

"The 6-0 versus Tribe was a big confidence boost along with the finals or grand finals with LG because it really showed what we're capable of doing when we're actually locked in and confident and playing as a team," JesusSaves said, referring to Team Mayhem's matches against Tribe Gaming and Luminosity during Stage 4.

"We could have still done some optimizations, but since that moment in Stage 4, we've been working on achieving them," he continued. "So coming into Stage 5, that's where we're gonna put it down and show them why we're the best."

KBR agreed, adding that Stage 4 was actually the first time players got to really duke it out at a LAN event of that caliber. For context, the folks behind the Snapdragon Pro Series circuit that's powered by Samsung Galaxy include ESL FACEIT Group (EFG) and Qualcomm Technologies Inc.

"I knew that Stage 4 would be a make or break tournament because for the first time, most of these guys are playing on LAN," KBR told esports.gg "I didn't know how they were gonna perform because I only knew that Jesus played online and Blurr played online. So it was a special tournament and they did show up."

While Cartels said he doesn't really have a favorite moment, one of the highlights of the circuit was him becoming the undisputed MVP of Stage 4. "It gave me like an extra boost of confidence for this Stage 5," he said.

As Team Mayhem's IGL, JesusSaves keeps the team together both during matches and even outside of the game. He's also well-versed on everyone's strengths and playstyles. For example, he emphasized how Cartels has remarkable adaptability.

"My playstyle hasn't changed too much," Cartels confirmed. "Because I've always been the player to adapt to how they play and instead of making them adapt to how I play. Whatever the team is going to do, I'll do it. And if I ever want to do something like a solo play or something, they'll allow me to do it."

JesusSaves told esports.gg how KBR is great at finding blind spots and training the team reasonably after matches as well. KBR himself confirmed this, describing Team Mayhem's daily scrims and VOD reviews alongside how important it is to find the right balance between training sessions and letting everyone relax.

As for other Team Mayhem players, JesusSaves said that Kingz brings the energy and is really good with map control, Angel "Blurr" Gonzalez does impactful shotcalling, and AyeoRaph has the best movement. Additionally, Pepe is known for getting aggressive frags and being skillful in gunfights.

JesusSaves also talked about how he keeps the team together during intense matches. He recalled how his team once played against Luminosity on the Arsenal map.

"We were down like 100 points," he said. "And so just on the rotation to the next hill, I just said a little speech to get everybody's head back and locked in like, 'We're not done. We're gonna come back. We still can do this and turn the game around.' And after that one little speech, mid rotation, I think everybody locked in more. And we ended up making a huge turnaround in the game. We came back from the 100-point deficit and we even had the lead at one point."

JesusSaves added that he plans to continue with this throughout Stage 5, making sure that everyone on his team is going to thrive.

"Outside of the game, I would say praising the teammates whenever it's good to," he said. "That's always helpful — making sure that they have the confidence knowing that we can actually win this and that we will win it. I don't ever like to say 'If we're going to win.' I always like to say 'When we're going to win.'"

The players shared their plans after Stage 5 as well. JesusSaves plans to stick around for the Snapdragon Mobile Masters 2024 matches. However, he does have plans to go into business, candidly offering more realistic thoughts about his future.

"And I mean, we're getting older, we got to pay the bills, we got to not just pay the bills, but have more than enough to be comfortable and help others around us and eventually help the world," he said.

Meanwhile, KBR is excited about the aforementioned Mobile Masters tournament in Brazil. As for Cartels, he plans to compete in CoD Mobile for another year and go with the flow.

That's all for now. Don't forget to cheer Team Mayhem's players on at DreamHack Atlanta and beyond. Stay tuned on esports.gg for more CoD Mobile news, interviews, and updates!