Update: Apex Owner David Slan has provided a second statement to ESPN regarding the matter:
"To be clear...no one is being kicked out of the house. The team is not playing again for six months, and we may or may not be keeping this house for the next CS team. If we do leave, it will be at the end of this month. So we are providing transportation for the players back home. This will allow us to get the house cleaned up should we decide to move. Since the team did not perform as expected, we will be deciding what to do about personnel over the next few weeks. But when a team does not perform, it is obvious that changes must be made."
Original story continues below.
Apex Gaming is forcing its League of Legends Challenger team, Apex Pride, to leave its gaming house after the team failed to qualify for the Challenger Series playoffs. The move comes two days after losing the qualification tiebreaker to Dream Team on Wednesday night, sources close to the players and organization tell ESPN.
Apex Pride's players, which include Cristian "Cris" Rosales, Danil "Diamondprox" Reshetnikov, Danny "Shiphtur" Le, Oh "Roar" Jang-won and Kevin "KonKwon" Kwon, will have until later today or tomorrow to leave the premises. The player contracts gave Apex Gaming owner David Slan the power to fire the players at any given time for any given reason, sources say. The team's manager and coach, Jamie "Sonder" Robinson and Alberto "Crumbz" Rengifo, will have until next week.
Well if anyone knows of any team that has a job opening lmk. 👌🏼 looks like I'm probably going home boys. 😔
- Jamie (사랑해) (@APX_Sonder) July 7, 2016
LF room to rent near the Santa Monica area
- Alberto Rengifo (@ProphetCrumbz) July 7, 2016
In a statement, Slan said, "We have not made any final decisions about how we will be handling personnel for our Challenger team, or our Challenger team house. Because we did not qualify for the CS playoffs, the team will not play again until January 2017. So obviously, we need to think carefully about the best way forward. Our performance in the Challenger Series was certainly not up to our expectations. As a result, it is certainly necessary to make changes."
The players' futures are uncertain. Sources say Diamondprox may have the opportunity to continue competing under the Apex Gaming League Championship Series team; meanwhile, he will return home before that decision is made. It's unknown at this time if any of the other players will be given that same chance.
Support KonKwon announced via Twitter on Thursday that he was retiring from competitive League of Legends following the news. The remainder of the players have remained silent on social media about their next actions.
so ya long story short, I'm quitting league~ thank you to the people who supported me!
- kwon (@konkwon) July 7, 2016
Additionally, Roar was taken to the airport Friday afternoon to return to South Korea, sources close to the team say.
Originally predicted to be one of the best teams in the Challenger Series, Apex Pride fell short of expectations with a fifth place finish.