The Immortals Gaming Club is not happy with Argentinian org 9z, over the transfer fee of Ignacio “meyern” Meyer. At the Superior Court of California, IGC (The Immortals Gaming Club) claim a breach of contract over meyern by 9z and is taking action about it. There was a 35,000 dollar transfer fee that was agreed upon but has not been paid, according to the North American org. Immortals Gaming Club claims 9z “never paid the buyout fee, nor any portion of the buyout fee,” and if true, that’s truly unfortunate.

As per the original agreement, any issues will be seen in California Superior Court in Los Angeles. The claim by Immortals Gaming Club on the 9z transfer seeks damages, but the specifics are not known at this time. We do know that they include but are not limited to unpaid transfer fees. According to Dexerto, they obtained proof that the settlement attempts went nowhere, and that 9z would take long periods of time to even contact The Immortals Gaming Club.

There’s a lot of bad faith actors in esports, perhaps too many. Lots of people take advantage of esports players, and this feels like yet another example of that. In December 2019, MiBR (owned by IGC) signed meyern from Sharks Esports. Six months later, meyern was sold to 9z from Immortals Gaming Club, which led to a transfer. It sounds like 9z didn’t hold up their end of the bargain either.

Tomi Kovanen, IGC’s Chief Operating Officer spoke about the issues with bad apples in esports, discussing that it’s as much about what they are owed as it is about rooting out bad behavior in the esports industry.

“Like other nascent industries, esports has an issue with bad actors abusing others for financial gain. Teams sign players to punitive contracts, illegally withhold pay or refuse to honor agreements, and tournament organizers disappear without paying out prize money. Luckily, very few experience it directly, but everyone in the industry is impacted by the erosion of trust.”

The PR director for 9z claim that they attempted to pay, but during the pandemic, the Central Bank of Argentina changed its regulations. This included limiting bank transfers in foreign currency and transfers in dollars, for the payment of debts.  They further claimed 9z would make the payment with certain “characteristics”, which cannot be disclosed.  This is not the sort of thing we want to see in esports. If the claim sees the court, we could see further action by the ESIC. If they get involved, sanctions or penalties could be handed down to 9z, so they couldn’t participate in CSGO competition in the future. It’s disappointing to see meyern or anyone be involved in transfer issues, such as between Immortals Gaming Club and 9z. Hopefully, this can be resolved amicably, but we will keep you up to date as this story develops.