team see sk telecom t1 . sk gaming location germany csgo brazil founded 1997 manager s alexander t. m ller rodic sponsors medion intel asrock kingston bigben steelseries divisions league of legends quake counter strike global offensive website http www.sk gaming.com sk gaming is a professional esports organization based in germany that has teams across the world competing in different titles . sk is particularly known for their success in counter strike cs tournaments . sk s brazilian cs team won the esl one cologne 2016 major . sk is one of the founding members of the g7 teams . 1 sk currently has players and teams competing in league of legends quake smite sports video games hearthstone heroes of warcraft world of warcraft rocket league and vainglory . sk gaming was founded in 1997 by a small group of quake players in oberhausen . contents 1 history 1.1 beginnings 1.2 later years 1.3 stability issues and reorganization 2 league of legends 3 business model 4 current roster 4.1 league of legends 4.2 quake 4.3 counter strike global offensive 5 notable alumni 6 selected achievements 6.1 counter strike 6.2 zonerank rankings 6.3 quake painkiller & unreal tournament 6.4 warcraft iii 6.5 world of warcraft 6.6 counter strike global offensive 7 references 8 external links history beginnings schroet kommando was founded in 1997 as a german quake clan by four brothers and three accomplices in oberhausen . the original line up of schroet kommando consisted of ralf griff reichert daniel godlike beames tim burke reichert benjamin kane reichert kristof speed salwiczek carsten storch kramer and sven ramses t mmers . 2 according to ralf reichert the original naming of the organization originated from one of the members repeatedly shouting schr t this was a common occurrence from whenever a double barreled shotgun would be handled due to the translation meaning shrapnel . eventually the team adopted this into their name thus becoming schroet kommando . since then the organization began using their abbreviation more often until it eventually became sk gaming . 3 initially the beames family home operated as the schroet kommando headquarters concentrating primarily upon the quake series . early on schroet kommando became one of the first clans to feature an all female team ; the most notable of which was annemarie xs warnkross who is a notable current television host on german tv . the organization expanded into counter strike where it became known as one of the most successful squads in all of germany . in september 2001 andreas bds thorstensson merged his geekboys team and news syndicate with that of sk gaming with a long term prospect of emphasizing the success of his own organization . thorstensson revolutionized electronic sports by having sk act as the first organization to have payable premium services sk insider a virtual marketplace in which subscribers could download demos replays mods and add ons better and earlier than others talk directly to sk gamers etc. . 3 the organization s international counter strike success came when they signed on the players of the successful swedish counter strike clan ninjas in pyjamas . in 2003 sk gaming became the first electronic sports organization to contract players beginning with the sk sweden counter strike squad . 4 later years the 2006 season brought no successes to the counter strike team the most notable of which the team failed to qualify for the electronic sports world cup in which sweden was represented by rivals ninjas in pyjamas and the developing fnatic team . thereafter the team managed to qualify for the kode5 finals where they won two matches and lost to the brazilians from made in brazil during the group stages . they then lost to wisdom nerve victory in the single elimination round placing fifth to eighth overall . success did come for the quake 4 squad however as the swedish star player johan toxic quick managed to win eight out of the ten major tournaments during that year including four out of five world championships . meanwhile the fifa 06 squad had a successful year as the team managed to win the prestigious electronic sports league pro series twice and the german player daniel hero schellhase won the world cyber games championship . in 2008 sk gaming began to invest in world of warcraft and shortly before the release of the sunwell plateau the final and most challenging raid encounter of world of warcraft the burning crusade the organization sponsored curse one of the highest ranked guilds at the time . 5 sk gaming s german competitor mousesports had significantly commanded the recognition with maintaining nihilum the most successful guild in the world achieving a strong majority of world first raid kills . the newly recruited sk.pve squad however had a strong winning streak during the sunwell plateau and completed most of the instance s boss kills first . 6 due to differences in interests the pve team was dismissed with a stronger emphasis upon the pvp aspect . 7 near the end of 2008 sk gaming entered the competitive console scene with acquisition of a german xbox team . 8 stability issues and reorganization beginning in the fall of 2009 the counter strike squad would encounter long term stability issues as long time member kristoffer tentpole nordlund and marcus zet sundstr m were removed from the roster for disagreements and misrepresentation issues . 9 the roster began refocusing with the acquisition of h2k gaming players johan face klasson and frej khrystal sj str m which gained its best respective victory two weeks after the change with a gold medal victory against fnatic . 10 2009 marked the conclusion of managing director and partial owner andreas thorstensson s tenure as he stepped down from sk gaming to further pursue his web development career giving full executive authority to alexander t. m ller rodic thereby making sk gaming a singular german organization . 11 alongside thorstensson s departure the highly successful warcraft iii departed as well in order to make way for sk gaming to operate as a more conservative business . 12 13 to accommodate for the counter strike stability issues sk gaming announced the replacement of frej khrystal sj str m with the former fnatic player rasmus gux st hl . 14 in one of the greatest controversies in electronic sports history the organization fnatic arranged for rasmus gux st hl to rejoin their counter strike team after a series of failed performances . 15 16 st hl did not technically sign his contract with sk after five months while still receiving months of payment and was intended to attend arbalet dallas with his team after his plane ticket was purchased . however it was revealed through st hl s message logs that fnatic had paid him not to use sk s ticket to dallas 17 despite the closure of sk s investment into the action rts scene with the departure of its defense of the ancients team in 2009 18 sk gaming took in a squad for the relatively unknown title avalon heroes in 2010 as well as an american heroes of newerth squad and a european league of legends squad . 19 in august 2010 welcomed back warcraft iii veteran fredrik madfrog johansson with the creation of the organization s starcraft ii division . 20 2010 marked the final year in which sk gaming would support world of warcraft with the removal of its european american and asian squads as well as the unannounced closure of its sansibar squad . 21 on december 3 it was announced that the german fifa duo of daniel hero schellhase and dennis styla schellhase would be retiring from esports following a joint brotherly career as the most successful virtual sports players of all time . 22 in a massive counter strike roster overhaul on december 7 sk gaming signed on the departing fnatic players patrik f0rest lindberg and christopher get right alesund the latter of whom played for the organization previously while also seeing the departure of dennis walle wallenberg . 23 on december 21 it was announced that sk gaming would be closing its counter strike female team as well as its short lived counter strike source team in order to retain a more conservative roster for 2011 . 24 the first development of 2011 constituted the trimming of the xbox 360 sports roster and the addition of a competitive call of duty black ops team 25 as well as the addition of newcomers hun inuh park and jimmy jimpo w lfinger to the starcraft ii team . 26 these new starcraft ii players would however become the entirety of the division as it was soon announced afterwords that fredrik madfrog johansson would not be given a contract for 2011 . 27 on january 16 it was announced that sk gaming would be adding another united states counter strike division which would include former sk gaming female member alice ali lew . 28 on february 28 sk gaming announced that toshiba would be taking the reins of main sponsor from acer inc. which had served as the primary sponsor since 2009 . 29 on march 12 sk gaming announced the additions of the up and rising starcraft ii dane johannes sabroe joe witt 30 as well as a bloodline champions squad . 31 on april 4 five year counter strike player jimmy allen all n announced his inactivity due to considerable health ailments setting the stage for the trial replacement dennis dennis edman . 32 however on may 23 sk gaming declared that edman would no longer be playing for the organization and that all n would participate in the wcg swedish qualifier the following weekend . 33 on may 29 however a permanent replacement was made with the still contracted fnatic player and former sk stand in marcus delpan larsson . 34 on june 23 following a disappointing dreamhack appearance sk gaming s league of legends team underwent a massive overhaul removing the vast majority of the squad but bringing in recently dismissed players from other professional organizations . 35 on july 1 it was announced that the sk gaming s heroes of newerth team would be replaced by the former squad of evil geniuses . 36 on independence day of 2011 sk gaming released its european starcraft ii roster consisting of hun inuh park jimmy jimpo w lfinger and johannes sabroe joe witt citing unsatisfactory performances . 37 the squad was remade however on july 15 with the partnership with the south korean pro gamer house old generations for sk gaming to sponsor min chul mc jang and yoon yeol nada lee for international events . 38 due to long term prospective differences the heroes of newerth once again parted ways with the organization during sk s attendance at gamescom . 39 sk gaming would invest in a different sector of the action rts scene however with the acquisition of an all danish dota 2 squad previously known as next evolution esc in november 2011 40 but dismissed the team for the unpredictability of the relatively young scene for the game . 41 in early 2012 the partnership between sk gaming and old generations ended with min chul mc jang joining the organization while yoon yeol nada lee remained with ogs . 42 in a surprising move sk gaming announced that the counter strike team would be removing the player with the shortest tenure marcus delpan larsson in favor of their first permanent danish member and former mtw ace martin alexander trace bang heldt at the end of january . 43 on april 13 however larsson once more returned to the team replacing heldt . 44 on july 27 2012 it was announced that sk gaming s counter strike division would lose robert robban dahlstr m patrik f0rest lindberg and christopher get right alesund as well as team captain anton budak due to sk s decision to not send