Thebausffs explains why Los Ratones belongs in the LEC

Right after their win over T1 at Red Bull: League of its Own, I sat down with Thebausffs to ask about why a huge streamer like him would want to get involved with pro play. As it turns out, he’s got aspirations far beyond playing in tier 2 leagues.

While his playstyle might be a bit of a meme and he’s known partially for getting banned because of how often he dies, Thebaus is taking this very seriously. It’s not just a matter of him dying on purpose and throwing matches, he plans to put strategies like full AD lethality Sion to work on stage.

Considering he solo killed Faker with full AD Sion in a stage game, there may be something to it. Thebausffs has long been known as the “good death” guy, with his unique playstyle being a key part of his rise as one of LoL’s biggest streamers.

But he’s motivated to prove that there’s more to his playstyle than that. G2 Caps isn’t sold on Thebaus being LEC level just yet, but the streamer-turned-pro is determined to do whatever he needs to for Los Ratones, Caedrel‘s League of Legends team, to defy expectations.

According to him, Los Ratones has the potential to be an LEC team and make it to Worlds one day.

Thebausffs wants to win Worlds with Los Ratones

The below interview was conducted in the minutes following Los Ratones’ win over T1 at Red Bull: League of its Own:

Do you feel like this game [against T1] proves that the int strategy you’ve been working on for years actually works and that it’s not just a meme? 

If I’m going to be honest with you, I don’t think I played super well this game. I did the inting, I didn’t do much of the strategy. (laughs) But you know, I thought, at the end of the game, I thought I did all right even though the early game was a little bit rough. I died a little bit, but that’s okay. It’s okay to die a little bit sometimes. I think it proves that the strategy is really good, yes. 

Riots banned you a few times for doing this stuff at solo queue. Do you feel like Riot’s view of how the game should be played is a little too narrow? 

Nah, that’s not Riot’s fault. It’s… They’ve got to have some way of banning people who intentionally feed. And then I just happen to die a lot of times sometimes. Then, I just happen to be on the automated, like, ‘Oh, this guy’s a feeder, get him!’ So, I don’t blame them. I really don’t, you have got to have a system in place. I happen to sometimes get banned. 

I don’t get banned much anymore. I kind of cleaned up my play a little bit. I would just die a lot more then, it was worse. But yeah, I think it’s fine. I wouldn’t hate Riot for that. 

So it feels like the fan response has 180’d since this roster was announced where people kind of looked at you as a meme player when you came on, and now you’re kind of the star player in a way. It feels like you have everybody’s attention. Were you expecting to be a star player on a team with big names like Nemesis and Rekkles on it? 

I mean, I’m not the star player, okay? Definitely not. I’m surrounded by four amazing teammates. I would not win a single game without any of them, okay? I remember at the start when I just joined the team, everybody was like, ‘This f**king inter is just gonna destroy the whole team, solo lose every game.’ So be it, you know?

But I’m happy people have changed their mind, that they do see me as – like, I can compete with other people, I’m not gonna be a liability. As I said, I am surrounded by superstars, like we have Rekkles, Nemesis, Crownie is amazing, and Velja is up and coming, a really good player. I’m surrounded by really good players. 

I just don’t want to be a liability. I want them to be able to count on me. I wouldn’t say that I’m the superstar of the team. No, that is a ridiculous thing to say in my opinion.

Why did you decide to go for pro play in the first place? Because, I mean, realistically, you’re such a big content creator at this point that you could have just streamed and been fine financially. What motivated you? 

Yeah, I mean, a huge part is Caedrel. He set it up so that… If you want to be a pro player, there are not many pro players who can also manage a streaming career. A lot of people who go into pro, they kind of lack on the streaming.

Sure, there are streamers that are also pros, but they also stream, like, once every other day. The scrims are so long and work days, so they don’t really get a streaming career.

Michal Konkol/Riot Games

Thebausffs alongside Caedrel during an LEC broadcast appearance in 2021

You know, I was able to work with Caedrel. He talked to me and said that he will make the pro team around streamers. So, we will stream most of our scrims. Streaming is a part of the team, which is really important for me because I would never give up my streaming career for a pro career. That was a game-changer that we could manage both with Caedrel.

Another reason why I went into here is because I want the challenge. I want something to strive for. I think this is something that I can do for myself and for other people to see that I can like accomplish something myself, accomplish something great. That’s what I want to do. 

It’s interesting because like you still have the int strategies, but I’ve heard in scrims that you have a great Ambessa, you have a ton of other characters up your sleeve that you’ve learned. What do you feel is the biggest thing you’d like to get out of being a pro player and putting in all this effort? Like, is there anything you really want to gain from this experience that you didn’t have before? 

I’m here to win it all, that’s all I really care about. Whether I do it on Sion or if I do it on Ambessa, if I do it on K’Sante tank, I don’t care. I just want to do everything I can, improve myself, and become the best I can to win everything.

So you’re winning Worlds right?

A little bit further into the future, but yes. That is the goal, eventually.

(Note: I asked this question about Worlds as a joke, Thebaus answered seriously. Sorry Baus, I wasn’t familiar with your game.)

I would assume that means you’d want to join LEC at some point, right? Like, is that an ambition you have as a player, or that Los Ratones has as a team? 

That’s something the whole team is striving for. We talked around, we believe we can compete there now. We’re not going to play there next year, but we all believe and we all want to go there.

If you were to be put in the LEC right now, do you think you would actually be a top team? 

We talked about this, and, from an individual standpoint, as a top laner, I can tell you right now that there are some top laners in the LEC that are completely boosted. They’re really, really bad. They’re paycheck stealing. They don’t belong there. I’m way better than a lot of LEC top laners. I wouldn’t say I’m the number one. 

Is my team better in their roles? Are my teammates number one in their roles? I could see an argument for that. Maybe Caps is better than Nemesis, but I could see an argument, right? But, as a team, I think we would do really good. Maybe not number one, because we’re a very new team. Saying number one would be very cocky right now. I think we would do just all right.

Me as a top laner, I wouldn’t place myself number one, but I would place myself a top three top laner in LEC easily.

This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.