In the last season of the North American League Championship Series, there were three rookies who began the season starting for their teams: Cloud9's Juan "Contractz" Garcia, Echo Fox's Matt "Akaadian" Higginbotham, and Immortals' Cody "Cody Sun" Sun. An avalanche of "Cody done" and "Cody stunned" comments flooded Twitch's chat rooms each time the young AD carry would fall in-game, which was often in his first few weeks.
When awards season came around, the two junglers, Contractz and Akaadian, battled to the end for the Rookie of the Split Award, and Cody Sun was left on the sidlines. Cody Sun had a strong finish to the season but not enough to overcome his earlier follies. The Immortals had failed to make the playoffs for the first time in the organization's short but successful history.
A quiet, reserved person away from the LCS Arena, Cody Sun went to work in the offseason to improve from his inconsistent rookie split. When things went wrong last split, he would blame his South Korean support Kim "Olleh" Joo-sung and vice versa for the team's issues in the bottom lane. Now, near the end of his second full season in the NA LCS, Cody Sun and Olleh don't stand as individuals, but a fully-fledged partnership -- one that has washed away the mistakes of the spring and replaced them with glory in the summer. Immortals has reached the of the NA LCS standings with only four matches remaining on the schedule.
"[Olleh and I] worked really hard at the end of spring going into the summer," Cody Sun told ESPN.com after Immortals secured sole possession of first in the NA LCS. "We took all the criticism, even from Reddit, our coach, our teammates. In the beginning, we would blame each other and wouldn't get anywhere. [Now] we talk about it one-on-one, and we're actually really close now, probably the closest in our team. Anything we have a problem with each other, we bring it up right away and try to fix it ourselves. We don't hold anything against each other."
In the spring, Cody Sun and Olleh, like their outside relationship, was dysfunctional. At times the playmaking-happy Olleh would flash into a 2v2 fight without Cody backing him up, and in doing so tilt the bottom lane and dragon control to the opposing side. When one would go right, the other would go left, leaving Immortals to often wave the white flag in the bottom lane and focus more on the top and mid lanes. Recently, the two have been in-sync, Cody allowing Olleh to roam if need be, and Olleh thinking more about the bigger picture of the game instead of always going for the risky attack in a 2v2 situation.
One of the few amateur players from North America (Cody Sun was born in China, but has Canadian citizenship) that received a positive buzz around him when he debuted, Cody, formerly under the ID "Massacre," was a hot prospect that various teams in the NA LCS had an interest in before he eventually signed with Immortals. The team, coming off losing its star tandem in Heo "Huni" Seung-hoon and Kim "Reignover" Yeu-jin, decided to rebuild in 2017, and Cody, a fresh-faced North American player with large upside, was the crown jewel of that reconfiguration. And while he struggled through his first season as a pro, the team's patience with him has worked out, and Cody sits near the top of most positive statistical categories at his position in the NA LCS.
"My parents are pretty supportive -- really supportive," he said. "They watch all my games. My mom always tells me how excited my dad is when they're watching. They're really supportive of what I'm doing."
A fiery player in-game and a soft-spoken player out of it, Cody's personality is often showcased the most on stage. When glimpses of the team's communication is shown on broadcast, Olleh, Cody's partner, is screaming at the top of his lungs at every good play Cody makes, needling him to get louder as well. What could be considered a quiet rookie season has turned into a sophomore stint to remember, and like the other great AD carries before him that he looked up to as an amateur, Cody Sun isn't shooting for anything less than being the best.
"When I was a Challenger player, I really looked up to Jesper "Zven" Svenningsen and Alfonso "mithy" Aguirre Rodriguez from G2," Cody Sun said. "Zven was a rookie only a few years ago, and he and mithy pretty much established they were the best in EU for the longest time, and they have really good synergy and are really friendly. For me personally, I want to find a support, whether it's Olleh or someone else, and just try to establish [ourselves] as the best bottom lane in North NA for years to come."