'CS:GO' pro kicked off team after complaining about players' rights

As of Friday, professional Counter-Strike: Global Offensive player Sean Gares no longer has a team.

Following the publication of an open letter signed by 25 North American CS:GO players regarding players' rights and the Professional Esports Association (PEA) league, Team SoloMid CEO Andy "Reginald" Dinh informed his player Gares that he was going to look for a replacement.

The letter detailed players' issues with the PEA, namely the league's lack of transparency with players and its attempt to block its league participants from competing in the similarly structured ESL Pro League. Dinh responded to the letter by contacting Gares, saying Gares should have communicated with him and the two ultimately parting ways. Gares posted the conversations online:

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In their communication, Gares said, "At this point I don't feel safe or comfortable in your org. I agree that it might be best for us to part ways."

Dinh responded in agreement, saying he would have his lawyer draft a termination agreement.

Along with his direct communication with Gares, Dinh released a statement in response to the removal of Gares and the original open letter about the PEA, saying Gares had manipulated fellow TSM players into signing the letter without them knowing its contents.

Gares joined TSM on Dec. 14 -- just a week before he signed the open letter alongside his teammates and players from four other CS:GO teams. He denied Dinh's accusations, saying he did not manipulate his new teammates and did in fact speak with Dinh about players' feelings and actions regarding the PEA prior to the open letter's publication.

TSM's other four CS:GO players also denied that Gares had manipulated them in a statement.

"To address some of the statements made in Andy [Dinh]'s post, in no way were we manipulated by Sean [Gares]," the players said. "Some of us may have had more information than others or been more involved in this endeavor, but we all understood what we were doing when we gave the okay to put our names on the letter."

The PEA's response

The PEA responded to the players' open letter with its own open letter Friday, written by Noah Whinston, PEA player relations committee member and CEO of the team Immortals. All five of Immortals' CS:GO players signed the players' open letter Wednesday.

Whinston responds to the players' concerns about not being able to compete in leagues outside of the PEA, the reasons why the PEA doesn't think players can logistically compete in both PEA and ESL Pro League, and how the PEA pays players compared to how ESL pays players.

The PEA pays North American players at a much higher base than ESL does, partially because the PEA uses a profit-sharing method from its seven North American member teams. The organization said that this and tournament over-saturation in the CS:GO scene make it impossible for players to compete in both leagues.

"We’ll arrange a meeting with all of the players ASAP to discuss this and answer questions, so that they can decide as a unified body whether they want to participate in [ESL Pro League] or PEA next season," Whinston said in the letter.

The representative of the PEA players and the publisher of the players' open letter, Scott "SirScoots" Smith, replied to the PEA's letter with a few counterpoints. Whinston replied right back.

Both sides -- the player side and the PEA side -- cite communication issues as part of the problem, including failure to agree on meetings and phone calls to discuss PEA happenings.