And according to EternaLEnVy, he worked with the team, helping them to earn over a million dollars in the process, without ever signing a contract:

I’m sure people are going to talk about verbal agreements a lot and that I’m stupid for not signing a contract. Well maybe so. Regardless I’m going to run my own org this year and ask my team to be stupid and believe in me. The Secret that was meant to be, hopefully I will be able to bring it to reality.

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But EternaLEnVy, who went on to form Team NP, wasn’t the only one allegedly getting stiffed by Team Secret. Rasmus “MiSeRy” Filipsen, who is currently with Digital Chaos, the rag tag band of Dota 2 pros who took second place at TI6, also put out a blog post today leveling similar accusations at the esports organization.

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MiSeRy’s post is shorter, and also well worth reading, but here’s one of the key excerpts:

Post TI6 I still had not received the money from tournaments in 2015 as well as Shanghai Major. I started writing Kemal about the payments. Initially when I wrote him he was on vacation and we agreed he would contact me once he came home. This is another example of where I had to initiate the conversation. At this point I was told it would come the next week, and then next week after that. I was unsure at which point I should start contacting an attorney, go public or what my next move should be. I wrote Puppey about it as well. Puppey told me they had very little workers in Secret, that I would get the money, and that he would get back to me as soon as possible. Didn’t happen. Basically didn’t feel like he gave a shit. So I contacted an attorney and he started poking Kemal instead of myself. Kemal told my attorney he would send the money in two payments, the coming Monday. I waited patiently, but nothing. Finally I talked to Envy, who also seemed to have a few issues of his own. Apparently he also wrote to Kemal, probably mentioning his infamous blog, and finally I got the payment. Side note is that w33 is still missing some payments from 2015 as well.

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These accusations against Team Secret come several months after Evany Chang, a former manager, detailed a timeline of events in which several players were denied prize winnings.

The evidence, as presented, paints a pretty damning portrait of Team Secret. It’s also a reminder of the ongoing challenges facing pro players in a business landscape that lacks a lot of the mechanisms, like agents and contracts, that might stop things like this from happening.