Dirty scammers and cheaters. Popular CS players who received a ban from Valve
Every fan of the game series dreams of getting into the professional Counter-Strike scene, but not everyone succeeds in making the path to esports. Some even have to resort to using cheats to do this. Most often, this path leads nowhere and ends with a logical VAC, however, in the history of CS there are several high-profile cases when cheaters still managed to get to the tier-1 stage.
In this article we will recall the most notorious bans of esports players. It is worth noting that they are limited not only to blocking for cheats, fraud is also strictly punishable and some players are still paying for it to this day.
Cheaters on tier-1 stage
One of the first cases of a ban for cheating was the Swedish player Joel emilio Mako, who played for Property. This blocking became a real phenomenon in 2014, because VAC arrived to the player right during the official match against Hellraisers at the Fragbite Masters tournament. At first, the cybersportsman denied his guilt, but six months later he finally admitted to using cheats. Joel emilio Mako said that he played with Wallhack only in matchmaking with his friends and never resorted to cheats on the professional stage.
But this case was not the loudest due to the rather low level of the Swede’s performances. The loudest scandal due to cheats was the situation with Hovik KQLY Tovmassian. The Frenchman managed to play for such legendary tags as LDLC and Titan and even performed at three majors. Even before his ban, there were many suspicions of foul play around KQLY: the most memorable moment was the clutch at ESL One Cologne 2014 against Jarosław pashaBiceps Jarzabkowski, when the esportsman delivered an unreal headshot with USP-S in a jump. Then no one could have thought that a case of cheating was possible at a major, but a few months later Hovik KQLY Tovmassian received a well-deserved VAC ban. Like Joel emilio Mako, the Frenchman confessed to his crime and stated that he used the programs only for matchmaking.
This is not the only high-profile ban in the French esports scene. Gordon Sf Giry, who also once played for LDLC, also received his VAC, and he finished his career with Epsilon. Unlike Hovik KQLY Tovmassian and Joel emilio Mako, the Frenchman did not comment on his cheating and simply went into the shadows. He also managed to play at two majors.
Another of the popular names banned from the French scene was Julien AREA Dubois. During his career, he never played for famous tags, but he had the opportunity to do so. Perhaps it was precisely to hide his deception that he rejected the invitation to LDLC even before his ban. Julien AREA Dubois did not admit to what he had done and blamed everything on a hacked account, allegedly people who had access to his account played with cheats.
As you can see, all the cases of blocking occurred in 2014, but a few years later another high-profile incident occurred on the professional scene. Nikhil forsaken Kumawat turned out to be the most ridiculous cheater, he was caught right on the LAN when he tried to remove the program from his PC. He managed to make the whole community laugh because he hid cheats called «Word.exe».
Fake matches and the price you have to pay for them
However, cheating is far from the only problem in esports. During the times of online tournaments, fake matches became very popular, popularly called 322. Bans for intentionally leaking matches last throughout the history of Counter-Strike, but the loudest and one of the first was the scandal with iBUYPOWER, which was one of the most popular teams American stage and performed at a high level.
The roster had a large fan base and had every chance to gain a foothold on the tier-1 scene, but it had a dark past behind it. Being an obvious favorite, the team lost to NetcodeGuides.com with a score of 4:16, making ridiculous mistakes: players made saves in non-obvious situations, and someone died with a knife in their hands. Thanks to the investigation of journalists, it was possible to prove that in this match large bets were made on the defeat of their team from the iBUYPOWER participants. When the team had already started performing at the largest tournaments and majors, he stopped doing 322, but no one forgot their previous achievements.
Only one player from the roster managed to avoid a ban – Tyler Skadoodle Latham. The esportsman continued his career and then won the ELEAGUE Major 2018 with Cloud9. According to his teammates from iBUYPOWER, the American was the only team member who knew nothing about his teammates’ intentions to leak matches.
One of iBUYPOWER’s most talented players was Braxton swag Pierce. At the time of the ban for 322, he was extremely young and promising; the community attributed his guilt to stupidity due to his age and pressure from older and more experienced teammates. However, Valve did not pardon the player and he has been banned for more than 10 years. However, his ban has expired and in January 2025 Braxton swag Pierce will be able to return to major championships and majors. The American has already started training in full. While he was unable to participate in tournaments, the esports player even tried to change disciplines, but he did not achieve much success in Valorant and quickly returned to CS2.
Coach bug
Not only dishonest cybersportsmen received bans, but also coaches. The list of mentor bans turned out to be impressive, but it is directly related to Valve’s error. During the coronavirus pandemic and constant online tournaments, a coaching bug appeared in the game, which made it possible to observe the opposing team. The loudest ban was awarded to HardLegion coach Aleksandr ZoneR Bogatiryev, who used it even against the strongest CIS teams, for example, Natus Vincere and Virtus.pro. Years later, the Russian had a chance to return to the professional stage, but he chose the path of media development and became a successful content maker, analyst and commentator.
Nicolai HUNDEN Petersen also became one of the banned coaches due to a bug, but he was not only noted for this situation. After the ban, he again found himself in a scandalous situation – as an analyst for HEROIC, he leaked the team’s tactics to the main rivals on the Danish scene, Astralis. The coach was supposed to continue his career there, but received another ban for two years. The controversial Dane returned to the professional stage in July 2023 along with the Sashi mix, which has now achieved success and even attended a major LAN – YaLLa Compass 2024.
In recent years, the practice of bans has become much rarer. It cannot be said that the professional scene has completely cleared itself of cheaters and 322, but such cases occur only on the tier-3 scene. Bans of these players occur almost unnoticed due to the low level of performance, but such scammers still have a negative impact on the development of esports, because they do not allow novice players to develop who cannot advance further.