Hai (video gamer)

For the Norwegian footballer, see Hai Lam (footballer).
Hai
Hai Lam
Status Active
Date of birth (1992-09-20) September 20, 1992
League League of Legends Championship Series
Games League of Legends
May 2013 - May 2015 Quantic Gaming/Cloud9
July 2015 - Present Cloud9

Hai Du Lam (born September 20, 1992), known in-game as Hai, is an American professional gamer who plays the multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) game League of Legends. Hai rose to prominence as the mid laner for Cloud9 (C9) of the North American League of Legends Championship Series. After a brief retirement due to health issues in 2015, Hai returned to the lineup of C9 as their jungler. Hai has won two NA LCS splits with Cloud9. He is currently the support of Cloud9, as well as their main shotcaller.

Early life

Hai Lam was born on September 20, 1992. He is from Grandville, Michigan and graduated from Grandville High School.[1] During his high school life, Hai was an active participant in the Counter Strike community, and enjoyed many Warcraft III custom games.

Hai moved to East Lansing, Michigan to attend Michigan State University, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Media Arts and Technology.[2][3] He was a prominent member of the League of Legends club on campus.

Career

2012

On May 25, 2012, Orbit Gaming announced the acquisition of the roster form Hai's n'Fear Gaming.

Afterward, Orbit placed 7th/8th at the 2012 MLG Spring Championship. At the Spring Championship, Orbit defeated vVv Gaming 2-0 in the first round, but lost 1-2 to Counter Logic Gaming Prime in the second round which placed them in the loser's bracket. In the loser's bracket, Orbit defeated Redact 2-0, Team Legion 2-0, and Team SoloMid Evo 2-0. They eventually lost to Counter Logic Gaming EU 1-2 in the fifth round of the loser's bracket.

On June 30, 2012, Orbit Gaming competed in the Leaguepedia North American Invitational. In the two day online tournament, they were able to finish in first place, most notably defeating Curse Gaming 2-1 in the quarterfinals and sweeping Team Dynamic 2-0 in the finals. On August 26, Orbit took fourth place at the 2012 MLG Summer Championship, losing to Dynamic 1-2 in the third place match.[4] This led to a tie with Monomaniac Ferus for eighth place in the North American Season Two Circuit Rankings. To decide the last spot for Season Two Regional Finals Seattle, a best of three tiebreak match was held. Orbit lost 0-2 to mMe and was denied a spot at the North American Regionals.[5]

2013

Competing under the name Team NomNom and then Cloud9, Nientonsoh, Hai, Yazuki, WildTurtle and LemonNation would secure a spot in the Season 3 North American Offline Qualifier for the inaugural split of the League of Legends Championship Series. However, Cloud9 would be knocked out of the tournament in the group stage after losing to Team MRN and Azure Gaming.

Initially, Nientonsoh said that Cloud9 would disband in light of the loss. The team later decided to stay together, although Nientonsoh and Yazuki would leave the team and a massive roster swap would ensue. Hai shifted from jungle to mid, and new junglers and top laners were actively being tried out in online competitions. With their final roster of Balls, Meteos, Hai, LemonNation, and SnEaKyCaStRoO finally being set, the team set out to qualify for the NA LCS.

2014

Hai was hospitalized after suffering a collapsed lung in June, which prevented him from attending All-Star 2014 in Paris.[6] CLG's Link replaced him on the roster.[7] C9 finished 1st in the 2014 Summer LCS.[8]

2015

Cloud9 finished second in the 2015 NA Spring LCS.[9] In the playoffs, C9 reached the finals, where they were beaten by Team SoloMid.[10] On April 22, 2015, Cloud9 Manager and Founder Jack Etienne posted on the Cloud9 website that Hai was retiring from competitive League of Legends and leaving the team.[11] This followed a post on the League of Legends subreddit that showed Charlie, the coach of Cloud9, chatting with a streamer on how Hai had left the house. Hai mainly blamed his wrist injury in his retirement, saying "My wrist injury is something that I simply cannot ignore. It limits my ability to play as much as I need to and my ability to improve. I cannot keep up with the amount of Solo Queue games my teammates play and it’s not fair to them. At best, my wrist injury would have only allowed me to play for another split and that wasn’t even certain."(Hai Lam) Hai also stated that the team morale was at an all-time low and that his teammates began to lose trust not only in his shotcalling, but his performance as a player.[12] Hai announced that he is now a Chief Gaming Officer of Cloud9.[13][14] He was replaced on the roster by Nicolaj "Incarnation" Jensen.[15] Hai became a temporary substitute for Cloud9 Tempest in June.[16]

Hai came out of retirement in the middle of the Summer 2015 Split and replaced Meteos as Jungler.[17] He helped the team qualify for the 2015 League of Legends World Championship by winning the North American qualifying tournament.[18][19]

Considered an underdog at Worlds, Cloud9 were placed into Group B along with Fnatic, ahq, and Invictus Gaming and expected to place last. Instead, they surprised with an undefeated 3-0 first week. In the second week, Cloud9 needed only one win to advance to the quarterfinals but instead lost four games in a row including a tiebreaker loss to ahq. They placed third in their group, ahead of only Invictus Gaming.[20]

2016

Hai was replaced in the jungle by former Team Impulse jungler Yoon-Jae "Rush" Lee, and instead shares the role of support with former Gravity support Michael "BunnyFuFuu" Kurlyo.[21] Hai is currently training BunnyFuFuu to become Cloud9's main shotcaller.

References

  1. ↑ Graaf, Mia De. "How Cloud 9 conquered South Korea's million-dollar gaming world". Daily Mail. Dailymail.co.uk. Retrieved 2015-09-21.
  2. ↑ Pan, Henry (2014-06-25). "Video games can be sports, too". The State News. Retrieved 2015-09-21.
  3. ↑ "C9 Hai Meet and Greet". Facebook. Retrieved 2015-09-21.
  4. ↑ "Featured Team: Quantic Gaming | LoL Esports". Na.lolesports.com. Retrieved 2015-09-21.
  5. ↑ "Back for Seconds: Quantic Gaming". YouTube. 2013-05-09. Retrieved 2015-09-21.
  6. ↑ Baker, Gavia (2015-09-02). "'League of Legends' star plays with a collapsed lung from hospital bed". The Daily Dot. Retrieved 2015-09-21.
  7. ↑ Baker, Gavia (2015-09-02). "Can Link replace Hai? Here's what the stats say". The Daily Dot. Retrieved 2015-09-21.
  8. ↑ Baker, Gavia (2015-09-02). "Hai's Yasuo puts Cloud9 1 game away from first place". The Daily Dot. Retrieved 2015-09-21.
  9. ↑ Baker, Gavia (2015-09-02). "Is Cloud9 set for another title run?". The Daily Dot. Retrieved 2015-09-21.
  10. ↑
  11. ↑ Baker, Gavia (2015-09-02). "Hai steps down from Cloud9 lineup". The Daily Dot. Retrieved 2015-09-21.
  12. ↑ Baker, Gavia (2015-09-02). "Hai on wrist injury, IEM failure, and why he's still on cloud nine". The Daily Dot. Retrieved 2015-09-21.
  13. ↑ "Thank you Hai — Cloud9". Cloud9.gg. 2015-04-22. Retrieved 2015-09-21.
  14. ↑ "Hai Leaving C9? : leagueoflegends". Reddit.com. 2015-04-22. Retrieved 2015-09-21.
  15. ↑ Baker, Gavia (2015-09-02). "Incarnati0n officially joins Cloud9". The Daily Dot. Retrieved 2015-09-21.
  16. ↑ Baker, Gavia (2015-09-02). "Yusui permabanned, Jintae and Hai called up to C9T roster". The Daily Dot. Retrieved 2015-09-21.
  17. ↑ Baker, Gavia (2015-09-02). "Cloud9's Hai steps in for Meteos". Dailydot.com. Retrieved 2015-09-21.
  18. ↑ Baker, Gavia (2015-09-02). "Cloud9 completes Cinderella run, qualifies for Riot World Championship". Dailydot.com. Retrieved 2015-09-21.
  19. ↑ Chen, James (October 4, 2015). "Worlds turns the League of Legends scene on its head". PC Gamer. Retrieved October 6, 2015.
  20. ↑ "2015 Season World Championship". eSportspedia's League of Legends Wiki. Retrieved 2016-01-29.
  21. ↑ Cocke, Taylor. "Bunny FuFuu and Rush Agree to Terms with Cloud9". www.redbull.com. Retrieved 2016-01-29.

External links

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