Parker leaves HEROIC after multiple social media posts pointing fingers to his former teammates. What did he say about them? Here’s all the information you need about the most recent Dota 2 drama.
HEROIC shocked the entire community with their announcement about the Dota 2 roster: David "Parker" Nicho was removed after failing to qualify for ESL One Bangkok. This is the first team in the history of South America that won an international tournament, and it was just after signing him. To make things more shocking, their X post indicated that Parker didn't want to win during their last series together.
Parker joined the team for the PGL Wallachia S2, competing against big names like Falcons, Tundra Esports, and Invictus Gaming. The young carry player caught everyone's attention thanks to his fresh style and versatility. Despite being a team that kept showing great skill, they didn't achieve another notable placement. In fact, they finished 13th-14th in the last DreamLeague S24.
The announcement points to "an incident during the ESL Bangkok SA Qualifier Final, where disagreements over the team's strategy resulted in Parker showing a lack of desire to win." As previously stated, it's not common for an esports organization to highlight the internal reasons why a player is removed. However, it may have felt like a necessity for HEROIC, considering how vocal Parker is as a public figure.
And just as expected, Parker delivered. He started by talking about how the games went, and he always tried to win. Despite his greatest efforts, in his words, the team was not working for the fifth game of their last qualifiers final; indirectly stating this game's defeat wasn't his fault.
HEROIC Parker's statement about his departure from the team
Moments after the announcement, the hard carry took to X to release his own statement. There, he pointed his finger to Kaffurtado, the HEROIC's head coach, and Davai Lama. Allegedly, Parker's ideas were constantly denied during the Draft Phase, and the picks only favored the "Brazilian players."
He also mentions the bad manners from his teammate, according to his point of view. The first thing is KJ calling him "weon," a Peruvian slang word that could be translated to "dumb" or "stupid". This is also a word that could be used in a friendly manner in Peru, but Parker could have felt this wasn't the intention.
However, what sparked Parker's fury was Davai Lama's attitude, described by him as "unbearable". This is impossible to confirm, since it happened during a private match, but we're only citing his words. Parker wanted Davai out of HEROIC, and asked for this previous to the qualifiers.
This shouldn't be taken as a surprise, since he streamed immediately after their 13th-14th DreamLeague S24 placement. There, he ranted for a long time about Davai's itemization, skill, and more. He later apologized to "everyone" for his words on Facebook, but never mentioned Davai Lama, or tried to say he was wrong for blaming his teammate.
To finish his statement, Parker also mentioned his discomfort with Kaffurtado's attitude, which he labeled as egocentric. Until the moment this article was published, none of Parker's ex-teammates have released any discharge about his words.
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Community reactions to HEROIC and Parker's statements
Since it was with Parker that HEROIC had its brightest moment, the whole community had a lot to say about his release from the official roster.
The first opinion was from the most successful hard carry of the year, Oliver "skiter" Lepko. He took it funnily, mentioning that now it's not Falcons the ones sparking drama in the community.
Despite not addressing the issue, Davai Lama himself posted about how proud he is of the team's professionalism after the incident. He also expressed that having Yuma as a stand-in is something he's looking forward to. Unfortunately for Davai, his post is full of hate from South American fans, who seems to agree with Parker. They also labeled him as toxic, but some supported him by blaming his ex-teammate.
The coach of The International 2024 winners, Blitz, also questioned HEROIC's decision to make the announcement. He labeled the situation as "hilarious", and also mentioned how talented he thinks Parker is. However, he also pointed out what most of the community agrees: Blaming everyone but himself is not the best way to improve, considering this is not his first kick due to misbehavior.
Lyrical, an active Dota 2 caster, also thinks that HEROIC may have crossed a line by publicly talking about Parker's behavior. The responses to this post were also questioning if this is the most professional way to address the situation.
HEROIC's future after their last roster change
The next international tournament for HEROIC is the BLAST Slam, and Yuma is going to be playing instead of Parker. After the recent disband by Nouns, Yuma was left as a free agent, and it's possible that the South American team is looking forward to a longer contract if they perform well together.
On the other hand, Parker options are reduced, since no team is currently looking for a hard carry, and the 2024 season is soon-to-be over.
Since there's no response from the players and coach, we don't know this other version of HEROIC. If you want to stay updated, be sure to keep following esports.gg!
