Ninjaboogie on hard times: "I was slowly going crazy and suicidal at times"

Michael 'ninjaboogie' Ross Jr. was recently expelled fromTeam SMG shortly before the start of the DPC SEA Season 2021/2022 Tour 3 Division 1 after his mother lost her battle with stage 4 cancer and left this world on May 20th.. The path of an esportsman is rather difficult and it would be useful to highlight this situation, since excluding a player shortly before the start of the Dota 2 league and leaving him without the opportunity to join somewhere is an extremely ugly act.

Michael shared his thoughts on social media and gave interviews. Here are collected his quotes, which refer to a particular period in life.

The difficulties of Ross Jr. began not recently, but several years ago. With the onset of COVID-19, ninjaboogie, like many people, lost his job and found himself in a difficult situation. In April 2020, the esportsman lost his father, who was experiencing serious health problems unrelated to the coronavirus. Over the next two years, the Filipino player spent his savings, on which he lived due to lack of work.

The incident affected the psychological state quite strongly.

Unemployment was one of the main reasons for my depression... as a man, you have to be the breadwinner of the family. I was slowly going insane and at times suicidal. What do I do when the money runs out, and eventually they run out?

After that, Team SMG turned to ninjaboogie and he became a member of the Asian team, thus finding a job for himself. At the beginning of 2021, he stayed with SMG for a short time, after which he left the team and took a break to get rid of the stress that had been accumulated. He soon began collaborating with Team SMG again. The latter, by the way, provided the player with a sports psychologist and his condition was on the mend.

According to ninjaboogie, he didn't know much behind the scenes at the club due to playing remotely:

There were a lot of things going on behind the scenes that I didn't know about because I was playing online and didn't want to hang out in discord a lot after the official games.[When I returned offline, I noticed that]MidOne and Moon had already quarreled, and the latter wanted to leave the team. They got into a[verbal]confrontation right before the DPC series, which I found out about later that night before I left[forMalaysia].

SMG management did not like this and the management held a rally in which all players could speak out and resolve differences. At first it helped, but as a result, the roster did not qualify for the Stockholm Major 2022. Later, another rally took place and it was decided to keep the roster. Against the backdrop of this event, ninjaboogie returned home to be with his family and everything was on the mend, but two days after his flight to Malaysia, his mother suffered a stroke and ended up in the hospital.

Michael Ross Jr asked management to reschedule the flight as the first days after a stroke are the most important and SMG went to meet him, and the ninjaboogie's ability to deal with a stressful situation in this case was appreciated by Team SMG's sports psychologist. Michael said this:

She was "shocked" at how well I took it. I think she expected me to be more negative, but I used that as motivation..

Ninjaboogie revealed that his mother, who was battling cancer, had turned down chemotherapy, and as a result, he was preparing for the inevitable and the worst:

My mom decided not to do chemo and I had to be realistic about it. I won't lie, it will hurt. I should just keep moving forward and use that as motivation.

Later, something happened that the ninjaboogie never expected. On May 14, MidOne invited him to a conversation to ask if the team captain was going to come to the bootcamp. The latter agreed. Later, MidOne called ninjaboogie again to talk, but the Filipino asked to reschedule the call, as he was busy preparing to leave and was busy with questions of who to leave his mother with. After completing the objective, ninjaboogie received the news that Team SMG was kicking him from the team. The decision was made in a meeting without a team captain, and the esportsmen decided that the performance of the esportsman would sag. Without giving him any explanation why the e-sportsman lost the chance to contribute to the development of the team, ninjaboogie shunned all SMG representatives. A short time later, the mother of the Filipino died. SMG manager Orrin Xu made it clear to the ninjaboogie that he tried to contact him. To Michael Ross Jr.'s surprise, Orrin came to the ninjaboogie to pay respect to his mother and express condolences for the loss.

Ross Jr. appreciated this gesture:

Two days go by and I'm actually very happy that he's here for the real reason and not everything we've been through has been fake.

Orrin Xu later told the ninjaboogie the details of his expulsion from the team. According to him, the management counted three so-called red flags, which signaled to them about the incompetent attitude of the player to his business. According to ninjaboogie, the staff misinterpreted his personal frustration as anger towards the team. There were other reasons from the sphere of insufficient or unsatisfactory communication, but the last moment was the death of the mother of the Filipino, which most likely could affect his performance. The SMG manager spoke to Michael Ross Jr. and asked him to post on social media about the dialogue he had with Team SMG representatives.

The Filipino player said that he intends to shine again on the professional Dota 2 scene, although it will not be easy:

It was hard, but life supported me to keep going forward,” said Ninjaboogie. “I'm still getting into it, but before my mom died, I wanted to do everything in my power to win for her. I'll take some time away from the stage and when I'm ready I'll try again.