NRG Esports’ Valorant roster reveal week continues with the announcement of Austin “crashies” Roberts, only the second player to be officially confirmed.
The former OpTic Gaming initiator reunites with in-game leader Pujan “FNS” Mehta and coach Chet “Chet” Singh, following a standout year where OpTic won Masters Reykjavik and placed within the top three at Copenhagen and Valorant Champions 2022.
The reveal hardly comes as a surprise. Crashies had been linked with a move to NRG since early October, alongside Victor “Victor” Wong. The duo had indicated that they wished to be signed together on a new team, after OpTic failed to secure a partnership slot in the Americas league for VCT 2023.
NRG Esports confirm crashies signing
Crashies started his Valorant career on T1, playing alongside storied names from CS:GO like Tyler “Skadoodle” Latham, Braxton “brax” Pierce, and Keven “AZK” Larivière.
In late 2020, he joined Team Envy, which would later become OpTic Gaming. Under FNS, OpTic became the best and most consistent team in the world by a mile.
They were arguably the top roster to miss out on a coveted partnership slot, with star player Jaccob “yay” Whiteaker going on to sign with Cloud9 and Jimmy “Marved” Nguyen announcing a break from Valorant.
On OpTic, crashies made a name for himself as one of the best initiators in the game on agents like Sova. At Valorant Champions 2022, he produced probably the most memorable highlight of the tournament — an ace against BOOM Esports on Fracture as the team tried to take the zipline.
That moment was eventually immortalized in an Easter egg on the map, with an email reminder about safety regulations on the zipline.
In the coming days, NRG is expected to announce Victor and FunPlus Phoenix star Ardis “ardiis” Svarenieks. Sam “s0m” Oh is likely staying from the original roster.
Finally, former T1 player Zander “thwifo” Kim is also reportedly joining as the team’s sixth man.
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