s1n: "We're trying to make JBa more than just an anchor"

M80 went into FRAG Miami 2 as heavy favorites, and despite not winning the event they did decently well in their first event with Joshua "JBa" Barutt. On day two the squad locked in playoffs over Voca, after which Dust2.us' Jeffrey "Mnmzzz" Moore spoke to Elias "s1n" Stein about adding JBa, the team's run at the Major, and the state of the German scene and BIG, among other topics.

Find the video interview below, with a full transcription underneath. All questions and answers have been slightly edited for length and clarity.

Not an unsurprising win, but perhaps closer than expected. How are you feeling about that win over Voca?

Winning feels good always, so that's a nice thing. Getting reps in with JBa is also nice. In the end we lost Mirage in overtime, and I feel like we could've won it but it's not that deep I think. It was good experience and we have to learn from that game and keep going.

So far are you feeling confident in the change to bring JBa in?

Yeah of course. JBa is a pretty easy guy... I don't want to say he's doing as he's told, because we're not telling him too much and we want him to be his own player and be confident in his own game and feeling confident. So overall we're feeling good and trying to get back in the first games of the season.

We didn't have any practice before this tournament, but we're glad to be back in the US and to play some more games.

Many were surprised by the decision to replace HexT with JBa. What can you tell us about that decision?

It's more in favor of JBa than against HexT. HexT is a great guy with a funny personality, talkative, and he brought a lot to the team with his clutch impact and key moments. He had that signature moment with the talk from Under against VP in BLAST London.

We had our best standing for each player in S-tier playoffs appearance, and overall it was a really nice time with HexT. But, the talent from JBa just overshadows HexT. He's a great talent and it's in favor of JBa for his development and what we think we can achieve with him rather than HexT did a bad job or there was bad blood or anything.

I hope HexT gets a new team and I'm wishing him all the best and hope he can find his way back into a team.

How does JBa fit into the team, is he mainly taking HexT's positions or is the team reoriented to fit him into the squad?

We're trying out new right now. For example I'm going to take a few eco spots and so far it has worked really good. Obviously JBa is an anchor, right, but we see more in him. So we're going to try and figure out where he can fit the best because we know he's an insane player with insane mechanical skill.

We're trying to make JBa more than just an anchor.

We last saw you at the Major, falling 2-3 in Stage Two after losses to Imperial and Passion UA. Do you think the Major laid bare any deficiencies in the team?

We had a really solid ground level kicking off the tournament at the Major and while the tournament went on the experience factor caught up to us. I would say the longer tournament went on the more reps we had on certain maps.

We had a lot of reps on Mirage, for example, so people started watching our games and adapting. We gained a lot of experience in that department with evolving our play book as the tournament goes on and playing around with more. That's what led to us losing in the end, especially in the Passion UA game.

For the Imperial game, we were playing too much off of what they forced us to do, especially on Mirage. We were going with the chaos while I think we should've played more of our game.

These are learnings that especially coming into 2026 we're trying to bring into our new game, especially with a new player. It's really beneficial for us having that experience.

Looking at "Rostermania" more generally, as a German player looking at the scene do you think it was inevitable that BIG would eventually have to go international? What's your assessment of the state of the German scene?

I love my German friends and we had a lot of great players in the scene. I feel sad for some like Krimbo, who obviously deserves a spot. Also my friend prosus has been getting in and out of the BIG team so that's really sad to see from the outside.

In the end it was inevitable, but also right now there's a second team building in AM team so there's players like k1to, kyuubii, and the new AWPer pxsl.

The German team hasn't been coming with new players and overall I'm a bit sad like how it's going because the German scene was alive and now after leaving BIG... I'm sad people get recycled in BIG. Like with prosus going out of the team you either see the vision or you don't

Obviously I don't know what's going on behind the scenes, but I know he's a nice guy... and they brought faveN back, another great talent. I'm lucky to call all these guys friends and been in contact with them over the years.

I'm looking forward to the international team with BIG that it gets German players to the top. That's the biggest thing.

Next week we'll see you at fl0m LAN. Any thoughts of that event ahead of it?

It's just amazing with NA bringing more of these tournaments. I'm locking forward to the fl0m LAN and I think it's going to be a bit more professional than the FRAG events. I hope it continues to go in that direction with events continuing to evolve with better prizepools because of VRS but also the standard of tournaments keeps going up.

Obviously its not the best situation to start a tournament on the 2nd of January because people have just come out of a break or want to have a break. But with this in the back of your mind you have to start playing around Christmas to get back in shape.

Overall, it's great for the scene with more NA tournaments and it gives so many lower-tier teams a chance. Also here at FRAG Miami teams can sign up and qualify for HLTV games. It's awesome to see we get more tournaments for NA and it's a good thing.

You brought up that we don't really have a player break anymore. Do you think that's a bad thing that we've lost that?

Yeah it's all about the VRS system as you said. It's about maximizing the rulebook of VRS to get the most points as possible. Just finding the best way to gain the most points and what tournaments you should avoid and where you can't afford to lose points.

I'm just a bit sad it went that way and some tournament organizers will profit off that and putting tournaments before an important invite deadline, that's the reason we're here.

We need to secure the points to qualify for the best tournaments in the world. I don't know if there is a better solution but I'm just a bit sad the break got cut short for some people.

Even when you know you have days off, people will prepare beforehand and will start playing earlier.

After fl0m LAN you need to the BLAST Winter Qualifier. Do you feel ready for that despite starting the year in NA?

Yeah I think so. Officials are the best practice to some extent, especially to feel out the vibes for JBa to get on track with our team. It's good to play a lot of officials and we're going to be in shape after playing due to playing for two to three weeks.

You should see peak M80 at BLAST.