The Poppin Swing is an integral part of VALORANT lore. Whether you’ve one-tapped opponents with this innovative technique or have been defeated by it during crucial rounds, almost all long-time players are familiar. We know the Poppin Swing works in all ranks, but now it’s headed into pro — Dallas-based organization EnVy has just signed a VALORANT roster with two famous YouTubers, including the Poppin Swing’s inventor. Here’s everything we know.
EnVy, formerly known as Team EnVy or Team EnVyUs, is an American esports organization headquartered in Dallas, Texas. EnVy is well-known for its performance in Call of Duty throughout the 2000s and 2010s. The org continued its COD domination in recent years, notably winning the 2020 Call of Duty League (CDL) playoffs with the team Dallas Empire. EnVy also branched out into other esports titles, one being Counter-Strike, where the team found sizable success and hosted various esports household names like s0m, ScreaM and karrigan.
In November 2021, fellow Texas-based organization and rival team OpTic Gaming, who had previously defeated EnVy in the 2017 Call of Duty World Champions tournament, fully acquired EnVy’s brand in a merger. The organization was defunct for several years as the two teams operated under the joint ‘OpTic Texas’ banner.
I was recently given the chance to re-acquire @Envy along with the @DallasFuel and @DallasEmpire brands. I took that chance… #EoD pic.twitter.com/wJZgmrwFMc
— Mike Rufail (@hastr0) January 17, 2025
On January 17 2025, Mike ‘Hastr0’ Rufail, EnVy’s former owner, announced on X.com that he had re-acquired the brand and would revive the organization. Hastr0 specified that he had assumed ownership of the aforementioned Dallas Empire and the Dallas Fuel, winners of the now defunct Overwatch League (OWL)’s 2022 Championship.
We have unfinished business in @ValorantEsports. So do these guys. https://t.co/DsdGobysTH
— Mike Rufail (@hastr0) March 8, 2025
EnVy’s return is not limited to pre-existing ventures. The team acquired an Apex Legends roster featuring several players from the team Loan Sharks almost immediately upon its return. In addition, Hastr0 has announced a full VALORANT roster, including multiple famous YouTubers and content creators.
On March 8 2025, EnVy’s official X.com account @Envy posted a full VALORANT roster reveal, captioned “A New Era of EnVy VALORANT.” The announcement included a video showcasing the team’s in-game highlights. Hastr0 also responded to the post, stating: “We have unfinished business in VALORANT Esports. So do these guys.”
EnVy’s VALORANT roster includes:
Notably, this roster includes a host of streamers and content creators. VALORANT players will immediately recognize Poppin, inventor of the infamous Poppin Swing which has terrorized the game’s ranks. YouTuber and streamer Eggster is another VALORANT household name, famous for his unique Yoru gameplay. Ion2x is one of the youngest players to ever hit Radiant — he began competing in tournaments at just 13 years old, and his content creator brother curry has over 260,000 YouTube subscribers. inspire, formerly known as BabyJ, has a Halo background and over 141,000 followers at twitch.tv/inspire.
Streamer teams are becoming quite a phenomenon in esports, with many emerging in fellow Riot Games title League of Legends. Content creators Caedrel and Doublelift have both created unconventional rosters, and Caedrel’s team Los Ratones recently qualified for the game’s prestigious EMEA Masters after streaming all of its scrims publicly and sweeping pro EMEA circuits.
EnVy’s new team previously operated as RANKERS, an organization of content creators and Competitive Queue players who unexpectedly performed well against pros in VALORANT’s Challengers tournament. This may be the first VALORANT team to follow LoL’s lead and include content creators of this magnitude. It remains to be seen how EnVy will perform in pro and navigate its roster’s public image, but the team can certainly leverage its fame in a content-focused approach to gain repute.
Matteo “Poppin” Weber is one of VALORANT’s most infamous content creators since the game’s 2020 launch. He has over 145,000 followers on YouTube at @P0PPINVAL and is also active on Twitch at twitch.tv/poppin.
Poppin has reached Rank 1 on VALORANT’s leaderboard several times and remains at number 33 as of March 9 2025, but perhaps his most unforgettable claim to fame is that he invented a new game mechanic: the Poppin Swing. The Poppin Swing is a widespread meme in the VALORANT community, and almost every player has utilized it during their VALORANT career and knows the tactic by name.
Usually, VALORANT players enter duels conservatively and will jiggle behind cover before stepping into the open and committing to a fight. Players also typically shoot as soon as they have vision on an enemy. However, in a Poppin Swing, the player will wide swing out of cover, move past their opponent and continue strafing in the same direction without firing a single shot.
This all sounds crazy, but the crazier thing is that the Poppin Swing works — and it sometimes works even better in high elo. Since its movement defies all VALORANT logic, many players simply can’t track their crosshair to it correctly and end up wasting their magazine before the Poppin Swing concludes, leaving the attacker to execute them with a headshot as they reload.
After creating the technique, Poppin’s highlight reels utilizing it elevated him to a VALORANT legend. His most popular video, “Killing Streamers with the Poppin Swing”, has over 2.6 million views. Poppin also released a video proving the swing works against pros, titled “Killing Pros with the Poppin Swing”, which has obtained over 1.3 million views. In additional content, he has used the Poppin Swing to climb to Rank 1 and proved it can be effective in every competitive rank.
Poppin will reportedly serve as EnVy’s in-game-leader (IGL) and play a large part in the team’s performance. The world will be watching to see if the Poppin Swing can conquer Challengers-level VALORANT once and for all.
Yoru is one of the toughest VALORANT agents to play in ranked, requiring strong game sense. However, when a player truly understands his capabilities, they can play mind games with unsuspecting opponents. VALORANT content creator Eggsterr is known as one of the game’s strongest Yoru mains, having reached Radiant Rank #1 on the agent in solo queue.
Eggsterr also has over 200,000 YouTube subscribers at @Eggsterr and over 231,000 followers at twitch.tv/eggsterr, where he refers to himself as “TikTok’s finest player.” Indeed, many of Eggsterr’s videos have performed well on the platform, and his clips of fake Yoru clones and outplays regularly go viral. Eggster seems to embrace his meme status and even uses a profile picture of the iconic ‘chad’ image with Yoru’s hair edited over it.
Importantly, Eggsterr has very little pro experience and is primarily a solo-queue Ranked player and content creator. His ‘TikTok’ playstyle is also extremely unconventional, adding to the disparity between ranked solo queue and pro strategies. Eggsterr has played against pros including TenZ, johnqt, Zekken and Oxy and held his own, but performing in an esports atmosphere will be the true test of his skill.
