 | |
| Divisions | Halo |
|---|---|
| Founded | 2005 |
| Location | Florida, United States |
Str8 Rippin is a professional Halo team in the United States that competes in the Halo Championship Series. Str8 Rippin was first formed in 2005 for Halo 2 on the Major League Gaming (MLG) Pro Circuit. Their most successful period was during the MLG Halo 3 Pro Circuit, when they won several tournaments. Tom "Tsquared" Taylor was their longtime captain and was considered the face of the team for several years.
Str8 Rippin was founded as Not So Str8 Rippin for the 2005 MLG Pro Circuit. After the first event of the year, at 4th-place finish at MLG D.C. on January 29–30, the name was shortened. The initial roster of Str8 Rippin was Fonzi, SyNeRGy, SadPandaEh, Foulacy, and Hathrow. [1] MLG San Francisco in February saw the debut of Ben "True Karma" Jackson, and the team finished 3rd. After San Francisco Str8 Rippin acquired future captain Tsquared. [2] again finished 3rd at MLG Houston in March and MLG Orlando in April. In June, the team did not attend MLG St. Louis. Str8 Rippin's first win came at MLG Philadelphia in June, where they beat Team3D in the finals, the only time 3D was beaten that year. [2] [3] In July, the team became sponsored by TrademarkGamers and began playing under the name TmG. [2] At MLG Vegas 2005 in August TmG finished 1st. The team took a two-month break and skipped attended MLG Nashville and MLG Seattle. At August's MLG Los Angeles, they finished 2nd at Team3D. After this event the team signed Matt "Zyos" Leto. TmG repeated the previous result at MLG Atlanta in September again losing to 3D in the finals. After this event, TrademarkGamers dropped the team and they resumed At MLG Chicago in December, Str8 Rippin placed 3rd. At the MLG New York national championships Str8 Rippin finished 3rd.
Str8 Rippin was one of three teams to appear on every episode of MLG Pro Circuit, a weekly program on USA Network. [2] Str8 Rippin finished 3rd at the national championships at MLG New York. [2]
Tsquared signed a three-year US$250,000 contract with MLG. [4]
Str8 Rippin captain Tsquared appeared on 175 million of MLG-themed Dr. Pepper bottles in the United States. [5] [6] [7]
Str8 Rippin qualified for the national championships at MLG Vegas on November 21–23. [8]
Str8 Rippin failed to qualify for the Reach national championships at MLG Dallas. [9]
Str8 Rippin competed in the Halo Master Chief Collection Esports tournament, the biggest tournament with Halo Master Chief Collection , and finished 2nd with a roster of Tsquared, Ryanoob, Lepar Messiah, and Str8 Sick. [10]
Str8 Rippin finished 6th in the inaugural Halo Championship Series (HCS) season. On April 3 Tsquared announced his retirement from competitive Halo. [11]
Str8 Rippin has recently returned to the competitive Halo scene, with a new roster of Heinz, A Pure Gangster, Ace, and Eco to represent the team in the fall season of the HCS Pro League. [12] [13] [14] [15]
Str8 Rippin returned with a new roster consisting of Heinz, A Pure Gangster, Ace, and newest member Renegade to represent the team in the Halo World Championship 2017.
Major League Gaming Corp. (MLG) is a professional esports organization. MLG is headquartered in New York City, New York and was founded in 2002 by Sundance DiGiovanni and Mike Sepso. MLG has held official video game tournaments throughout the United States and Canada. The Boost Mobile MLG Pro Circuit was a television broadcast of Halo 2 MLG tournaments in 2006 and 2007, ESPN.com, and other broadband sites. The company has also been involved in television production, and game development. MLG's aim is to elevate computer and console game tournaments to viable competitive and spectator events.
Matt Leto, known by the gamer tag Zyos, is a former American professional player of the first-person shooter video games Halo: Combat Evolved and Halo 2. Zyos spent a year in his late teens accumulating video game records, and for a while was the holder of the most records. After dropping out of DigiPen Institute of Technology, Leto pursued a career in professional gaming.
Tom Taylor, known by the gamertag Tsquared, is a former professional gamer and captain of one of the most successful teams in Major League Gaming (MLG) history, Str8 Rippin, and was also the coach of Status Quo during the 2010 National Championships in Dallas where he helped them place 2nd behind Final Boss. Making him one of the only players to also coach an event. He was signed to a US$250,000 contract by MLG and earned between $120,000 and $150,000 each year in prize money and endorsement deals. He has founded his own company, Gaming Lessons, which tutors prospective professional gamers on various video games, specifically on the Halo series. Several other professional gamers from MLG are also employed by Gaming Lessons as instructors. He also runs an active YouTube channel with over 10,000 subscribers and 24 hours' worth of content.
Dan Ryan is a retired professional Halo player, widely considered one of the greatest professional Halo players of all time. He had 32 Halo championship tournament wins and maintains the position of the highest-average placing professional player in Halo esports history.
David Walsh is a retired American professional esports player. His professional career in gaming began in 2004 under the name Walshy. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest and most successful Halo players of all time.
Ryan Danford is an American former professional Halo player known by the handle Saiyan. He was influential in the early days of professional video gaming or esports and played for the champion teams Shoot to Kill, Team 3D, and Final Boss: In 2006, Major League Gaming stated, "One of the true veterans of the league, Saiyan has been a force in Major League Gaming's upper echelon since its onset." Saiyan retired from professional gaming in 2007.
Ben Jackson, also known by his pseudonym Karma, is a former professional Halo player from Murrieta, California, United States. He attended Murrieta Valley High School. He started playing Halo intensively when Halo 2 was announced and widespread promotion of the Xbox 360 commenced.
Tom Ryan, known under the pseudonym Ogre 2, is a retired professional Halo player from Columbus, Ohio. He is widely considered to be the greatest Halo player of all time. He and his twin brother Dan are known as the "Ogre Twins". In 2005, the Ogre Twins won the gold medal in Halo 2 at the World Cyber Games. His esports tournament history includes in Halo: Combat Evolved, Halo 2, Shadowrun, Halo 3, Halo: Reach, Halo 4, Halo 5: Guardians, Halo 2: Anniversary, and Call of Duty: Ghosts.
Matthew Haag, better known as Nadeshot, is an American former professional Call of Duty player and the founder, co-owner and CEO of 100 Thieves. As a professional Call of Duty player, Haag was a former captain of OpTic Gaming in the 2014 Call of Duty: Ghosts season and the 2014–2015 Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare season, playing the objective support role.
Final Boss was a professional esports team that competed in Halo competitions sponsored by Major League Gaming (MLG) and other tournaments. With its most successful lineups consisting of a core of Dan "Ogre 1" Ryan, Tom "Ogre 2" Ryan and Dave "Walshy" Walsh, Final Boss is regarded as one of the best Halo teams of all time due to their numerous tournament victories and MLG National Championships from 2004 to 2010. They also hold the record for the longest consecutive event winning streak, with 8 straight tournament victories from 2005 into 2006.
Counter Logic Gaming (CLG) was an American esports organization headquartered in Los Angeles, California. It was founded in April 2010 by George "HotshotGG" Georgallidis and Alexander "Vodoo" Beutel as a League of Legends team, and branched out into other games.
OpTic Gaming is an American professional esports and entertainment organization headquartered in Frisco, Texas. The organization currently operates a Call of Duty team in the Call of Duty League, OpTic Texas, they also operate a Overwatch team in the Overwatch League, Dallas Fuel, as well as Rocket League, Halo and Apex Legends teams. They previously competed in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Gears of War 4, PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, Fortnite Battle Royale, Dota 2, League of Legends and Valorant. The organization is currently owned by Hector "H3CZ" Rodriguez and Mike “Hastr0” Rufail.
Boost Mobile MLG Pro Circuit is a television program on US cable television network USA, and later G4, airing recordings of the Major League Gaming (MLG) Halo 2 Pro Circuit in 2006 and 2007. It was sponsored by Boost Mobile and Scion. Boost subscribers had access to exclusive videos such as match highlights and player profiles. The production company was Red Brick Entertainment.
Team Envy was an American esports franchise based in Dallas, Texas, owned by Envy Gaming. Founded in 2007 as a professional Call of Duty team under the moniker Team EnVyUs, they fielded rosters in Counter-Strike, FIFA, Fortnite, Gears of War, Halo, League of Legends, Chess, Magic: the Gathering, Overwatch, Paladins, PUBG, Rocket League, SMITE, StarCraft, Super Smash Bros., Street Fighter and Valorant. Following the merger between Envy Gaming and OpTic Gaming, Envy Gaming retired the Team Envy brand in June 2022, shifting all of them to the OpTic Gaming moniker.
Splyce (SPY) was a professional esports organization and media company based in Rochester, New York. Their League of Legends team was a franchise member of the LEC, Europe's top professional league for League of Legends. Splyce announced its rebranding from Follow eSports in November 2015. On November 29, 2019, Splyce's parent company, OverActive Media, announced it had merged Splyce with its other esports subsidiary, MAD Lions, and that all of Splyce's teams would henceforth compete under that name.
Seth Abner, also known as scump, scumperjumper or The King of COD is a former American professional Call of Duty player who last played for the Call of Duty League team OpTic Texas. Abner is a two time Major League Gaming (MLG) X Games gold medalist. During the first ever Esports Awards in 2016, Scump won the Esports Console Player of the Year award. In August 2017, Scump achieved his first ever Call of Duty World Championship. Abner is sponsored by several gaming hardware companies, including Turtle Beach and Scuf Gaming. He also runs a YouTube channel that currently has obtained over 2.7 million subscribers and over 665 million channel views as of November 10, 2023. He is widely considered to be one of the greatest Call of Duty players of all time.
Peter Dager, better known as ppd, is an American former professional Dota 2 player. He was the former CEO of the esports organization Evil Geniuses, where he also won The International 2015 as a player-captain, later playing for OpTic Gaming and Ninjas in Pyjamas.
Ian Porter, better known as Crimsix, is an American former professional Call of Duty player and current esports driver. As an esports competitor he has represented multiple organizations in multiple game titles, most notably representing Optic Gaming and Complexity in Call of Duty.
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