Back in June 2025, when the North America League 2025 Stage 1 kicked off, a bunch of question marks surrounded a handful of rosters as the arrival of a new season meant the start of new storylines, with ENVY's initial steps in North America's top flight after achieving promotion, the return of Cloud9 to North America, or the debut of Oxygen Esports' new but highly-experienced roster arguably being the most anticipated ones.
Throughout Stage 1, ENVY was North America's punching bag as they could only win one out of nine games. The team's rookie stage included defeats against the Mexican lineup of Team Cruelty and the orgless mix of LFO — now known as STANDBY LFO. However, the second split of the season ended up playing differently, and both rosters have taken the spotlight for the worst reasons imaginable.
Sometimes, reality is just cruel, and more ambitious goals have to be put on standby. Today's clash between the two-bottom teams in the North America League isn't about scoring points; it's about restoring some honor. Regardless of tonight's result, nothing is going to change. But, what are Team Cruelty and STANDBY LFO escaping from?
A regulation defeat today would most certainly automatically make the fallen roster the worst-performing lineup ever in the history of North America's Siege, at least under the current stage format — which was first introduced in early 2021.
Team Cruelty and STANDBY LFO's Stage 2 results
To understand the caliber of tonight's match it's important to check the results of Team Cruelty and STANDBY LFO across the last three weeks of competition:
Team Cruelty
- 0-7 vs. ENVY
- 5-7 vs. Oxygen Esports
- 2-7 vs. DarkZero Esports
- 0-7 vs. Cloud9
- 2-7 vs. Spacestation
- 1-7 vs. M80
- 3-7 vs. Wildcard
The only time Team Cruelty were close from snatching a point from their opponents was against Oxygen Esports in what has been the Mexicans' best performance so far in Stage 2. The rest of them were one-sided defeats with plenty of inexperience, time-management, and communication issues.
On September 12, against Cloud9, the purple roster became the first team in North America's top flight to concede two 0-7 defeats in the same group phase under the current format, where the league is split into stages. Since then, Team Cruelty have only won six out of 27 rounds.
Curiously enough, during Pro League times, Cloud9 was the first team to concede two flawless defeats in the same season. It happened in the North American Pro League Season 8 when Cloud9 got two 0-6 defeats against Spacestation and SK Gaming. However, that happened seven years ago, between June and July 2018.
STANDBY LFO
- 5-7 vs. Spacestation
- 4-7 vs. M80
- 5-7 vs. ENVY
- 2-7 vs. Shopify Rebellion
- 0-7 vs. Cloud9
- 0-7 vs. Wildcard
- 1-7 vs. Oxygen Esports
STANDBY LFO had a not-so-bad start to Stage 2 which included three defeats against Spacestation, M80, and ENVY with an overall round difference of -7. However, the team's results plummeted abruptly with the arrival of Week 3 as STANDBY LFO have only won three out of 31 rounds since September 12.
On September 19, STANDBY LFO became the first North American top flight roster to get back-to-back 0-7 defeats, as they lost against Cloud9 and Wildcard in flawless fashion. Logically, STANDBY LFO became the secont North American top flight roster to concede two 0-7 defeats in the same stage; one week after Team Cruelty claimed the title first.
Where did it gone wrong for Team Cruelty and STANDBY LFO?
If we look at the league's stats we see that eight of the worst ten SiegeGG ratings in the North America League 2025 Stage 2 belong to Team Cruelty or STANDBY LFO players. The only two exceptions are Edwardo "Eddy" Díaz (0.83) and Fabián "Pyroxz" Zhao (0.96).
The Mexican is arguably the only player that escapes the negative trend as he's, surprisingly, the best entry in the North America League 2025 Stage 2 with an entry balance of 15-4 (+11). He's right ahead of Wildcard's Jacob "Bae" Dowling, DarkZero's Ben "CTZN" McMillan, Cloud9's George "Silent" Hernández, and Spacestation's Liam "Ashn" Paz. In fact, in basic terms, entry numbers display a big part of the history and explain where it goes wrong for these two teams.
The difference in this department between these two teams is massive: whilst Team Cruelty's general entry balance is 29-32 (-3), STANDBY LFO's is 20-46 (-26). Logically, the difference is even bigger compared to the top teams, with Oxygen Esports' leading the stat with an average entry balance of 47-31 (+16).
In Team Cruelty's case, the Mexicans lack the ability of transforming their entries. For instance, yesterday, Team Cruelty won three rounds against Wildcard despite collecting six entry kills, two more than their opponents. Another example is their 0-7 defeat against Cloud9, where the Mexicans got six entry kills but ended up the match with zero rounds won. Plain and simple, Team Cruelty's problems lay in their inability of executing and building up on what they make in the early stages of the round. The house of cards falls right after assembling the first bunch. Even when it all seems done, Team Cruelty find the way to throw it.
Meanwhile, STANDBY LFO have looked extremely weak in their early engagements. Three of their five players are among the seven worst entries in the league, including Krees "epic" Hudson, Landon "Beeno" Ashbee, and Julián "Kixhro" Velázquez, with entry balances of 6-11 (-5), 0-9 (-9), and 3-15 (-12), respectively. These three are surrounded by players who historically don't do well in this department, including Troy "Canadian" Jaroslawski, Nick "njr" Rapier, or James "JJBlazt" Letkovsky.
Although both Team Cruelty and STANDBY LFO have performed far below the expectations, as stats clearly indicate, we can't ignore the human factor. Players aren't machines. The lack of support seems obvious, especially in STANDBY LFO's case, as the team have been playing as an orgless mix for almost five months since Luminosity Gaming dropped them one week before the start of the competition. In a league with five Partnered teams, which get a great salary, that plays a big part.
While this can't be ignored, we're at a point where, even considering what has been mentioned right now, we should ask both teams for more. The basics are simply not being performed; zero points out of a possible 21 and such negative round differences can't be excused — both should do better.
One for the history books: what negative records could be broken?
The match between Team Cruelty and STANDBY LFO will build the competition's negative records for the upcoming years; future teams and players will look back thinking if the bar can set even lower than X or Y.
Some negative records that must be thought of are:
- Lowest amount of points scored: After seven matches played, Team Cruelty and STANDBY LFO both have zero points. The record is currently held by Beastcoast after finishing the North American League 2021 Stage 2 with three points after three overtime defeats.
- Worst round difference: After seven matches played, Team Cruelty (-36) and STANDBY LFO (-32) are close to breaking this record. The current record is held by Beastcoast after finishing the North American League 2021 Stage 2 with a round difference of -33 after eight matches played.
- No victories in a single stage: After seven matches played, Team Cruelty and STANDBY LFO are yet to win a match. The only side to finish a North America League stage with no wins was Beastcoast in the North American League 2021 Stage 2.
- Lowest average combined SiegeGG rating in a single stage: STANDBY LFO (0,784) and Team Cruelty (0,788) will likely break this record. At the time of writing, the worst average combined SiegeGG rating since BLAST took over the circuit belongs to ENVY (0,812) registered in the North America League 2025 Stage 1. For comparison, Team Cruelty and LFO's combined SiegeGG ratings of 0,914 and 0,928 in Stage 1, respectively.
In the case of reaching overtime, both teams would still have a chance to get more points than Beastcoast's three-point finish in the North American League 2021 Stage 2. Looking at the standings, Team Cruelty may have the most difficult end to the season as they will play against Shopify Rebellion, who could still be in the race for securing a group stage Top 2 finish. Meanwhile, STANDBY LFO will play against DarkZero Esports in the final play day.