Organized esports have overcome many scandals and have gone to great lengths to defend themselves against negative stereotypes and attention throughout the decades. Now, one of North America’s top esports organizations, Team SoloMid (TSM), is under intense scrutiny after several current and former employees accused owner Andy Dinh of creating and fostering a toxic workplace environment. Rumors of toxicity have clouded TSM’s overall image for years, but it wasn’t until recently that these allegations came to the surface.
Dinh is a very public figure in the esports scene and has been described as a passionate and vocal leader of TSM. But it seems to be exactly these traits that have TSM employees speaking out. Over the years, it has not been uncommon to see Dinh yelling at TSM’s players on stage in front of other organizations’ players and sometimes even in front of the fans. This behavior reportedly continued behind the scenes with all levels of employees of TSM. Based on the reports, Dinh had a bad habit of yelling, screaming, and personally degrading employees publicly to get his point across. On May 5th 2022, former TSM player Yiliang “Doublelift” Peng revealed Dinh and TSM threatened to sue him if he continued to express his concerns over Dinh’s behavior publicly on his streams.
While TSM committed to an internal investigation with an independent investigator, Riot Games (which operates League of Legends esports) decided to open their own in late 2021/early 2022 after more reports of bullying and verbal abuse by Dinh surfaced. TSM and Dinh have publicly denied these allegations in a January 2022 article published by Wired. In the statement, Dinh said,
“I have zero tolerance for underperformance. I am intense, passionate, driven and relentless in the pursuit of winning — it’s my nature. I set an extremely high bar, and when I feel that someone is not delivering, I directly and bluntly share that feedback. I do acknowledge that when I look back, my vocabulary was at times too harsh and ineffective. I know I need to work on my delivery, and I am working to improve the way I communicate with my team and those around me.”
Additional information on the allegations and investigation into TSM and Andy Dinh can be found here.
Image from: TSM
