The streaming company parts ways with its players after less than a year of sponsorship.
The worrying news regarding the health of StarCraft 2’s competitive scene keep coming. After the discontinuation of the 14-year-old ProLeague tradition and disbandment of five of the most accomplished teams including SKT, KT, Samsung, CJ and MVP, another company calls it quits on owning a StarCraft 2 roster: AfreecaTV.
Afreeca – a major Korean streaming company similar to Twitch.tv – made big moves towards involvement with the StarCraft 2 scene in 2015. In July, the company acquired the GOMeXP studio, the home of the prestigious GSL and later overtook operations of the league as official broadcaster in October, following GOMeXP’s shutdown. In January of 2016, Afreeca also moved into team ownership, acquiring the roster of the former Team SBENU (previously StarTale), home of decorated champions such as Ji-Sung "Bomber" Choi, Won-Pyo "Curious" Lee and Seung-Hyun "Life" Lee, who returned to the team after a year-long stint with KR Rolster a few days after the acquisition.
As Afreeca Freecs, the newly sponsored team made several big signings in 2016, including DreamHack bronze finalist Ji-Hyun “Patience” Jo and GSL runner-up Dong-Hyun “Symbol” Kang in March and April, respectively. Patience would end up being Afreeca’s most successful player of the year, just recently finishing first at HomeStory Cup 14.
Official announcement from AfreecaTV is said to come soon. There is still no information whether or not Afreeca’s sponsorship of the GSL will remain intact.
