Among the massive upsets and miracle runs at last month’s VCT Masters Tokyo, the biggest VALORANT tournament of the year so far, sits the disappointing seventh to eighth-place finish of South Korea’s DRX.

DRX, formerly known as Vision Strikers, was one of the first teams to put South Korea and Asia on the map as serious contenders in VALORANT. In 2023, nearly three years after the players of DRX made their debuts, the team was dominant in the inaugural season of the VCT Pacific League.

Yet, despite that dominant regular season performance, DRX lost their region’s grand finals matchup to Paper Rex in May and continued to struggle throughout Masters Tokyo. Their early exit marked their worst finish in an international tournament since Champions 2021, where the team failed to make it through groups.

The team’s season isn’t over, though. With their second-place finish in the VCT Pacific League, DRX also earned an automatic spot at Champions in Los Angeles, which begins on Aug. 7. But three years of building pressure and the weight of Korean VALORANT on their shoulders left the team in a worrying state that they’re hoping to bounce back from next month.

“I feel like it would have been the best if we could have gotten more out of Masters and had a deeper run,” DRX’s head coach Pyeon “termi” Seon-ho said in a post-match press conference after the team were knocked out of the bracket in Tokyo last month. “But, it means we can go back to Korea and focus on Champions.”

Through Masters and the latter part of the VCT Pacific League season, coach and player sentiments around the DRX team seemed to reflect players suffering from burnout. The players looked unusually worn out on stage and didn’t have their usual vigor and over-the-top reactions fans have become accustomed to. The concern of bunrout was confirmed by termi after his team lost the grand finals in a reverse sweep to Paper Rex.

In Tokyo, it didn’t look like any of the players were able to get much rest. In DRX’s press conference after their match against Paper Rex at Masters, player Yu “BuZz” Byung-cheol looked defeated, with his head in his hands. He stayed in this position, looking down at the floor, for the duration of the press conference.

DRX huddle on stage before their final match of the group stage at VCT Masters Tokyo.

It seems like the never-ending debate over whether Jung “Foxy9“ Jae-sung or Kim “Zest” Ki-seok should be playing for DRX—an issue the VCT Masters English broadcast kept emphasizing to viewers—just shadowed a much large issue. While Foxy9 has been hyped up as potentially the best duelist Korea has ever seen, he has lacked consistency, while veteran Zest has brought a calmer yet more “standard” option.

Despite this, DRX’s insistence on a six-man roster is just the tip of the iceberg. What went wrong for the players that they were so burnt out?

“I think it goes the same for other Pacific teams and teams in other regions. We had to play one game a week for eight or nine weeks, and it was definitely physically taxing for me and the players,” termi said at the press conference in Tokyo. “This is our first time going into a league play tournament, and I guess we overlooked that factor of taking care of the players physically, and taking care of their well-being.”

The VCT league structure only became standardized this year after Riot Games franchised the professional VALORANT league at the end of 2022. Suddenly, the format shifted from a tournament-focused structure to league play. This means teams had to play more often against a larger pool of opponents.

While some teams benefited from this structure, others—such as DRX—have clearly struggled to adapt. Though the team is full of experienced talent, the oldest player on the roster is still just 23 years old, making them one of the youngest teams in VCT.

DRX's BuZz holds up a fist on the VCT Pacific stage after DRX's win over T1.

Even before the start of the 2023 season, DRX players and staff were adamant about setting their goals high. At first, they wanted to get through the Pacific League without losing a single match. But coach Kwon “Argency” Soon-woo says the team and organization’s real goal was even higher.

“In the entire season, we emphasized our focus on qualifying for Champions and performing well there—mostly because Champions is the most important tournament in the entire year,” Argency said. “During that process, we felt the burden during VCT Pacific League and also practice for Masters Tokyo so ultimately all of us had a bit of a burnout.”

The burden of not only starting a league in a new format but also being one of the favorites to not only do well, but represent Seoul—where the entire VCT Pacific season, championship weekend, and recent LCQ were held—created new pressure DRX had never faced before. Through this pressure, Kim “MaKo” Myeong-gwan still earned the title of MVP for the VCT Pacific season with his outstanding controller play, showing the fundamentals of DRX’s core style were still shining through their mistakes.

Argency said there wasn’t another layer of pressure for the team having to represent the Asia-Pacific region at Masters Tokyo, but rather that the players enjoyed having a tournament in Asia for the first time.

“Most of the international tournaments we have had required us to hurdle over jet lag and different food,” Argency said. “But this time around we didn’t have to go through that. It was honestly quite nice.”

After their early exit from Masters Tokyo, the team came back to Korea and took a much-needed break away from the team house. After their time off, Argency said the players and staff are feeling refreshed.

As for DRX’s plan for the remaining time leading up to Champions, Argency said there will be a noticeable mental shift between the team’s preparation for the tournament compared to the practice they’ve been doing this year already.

“Knowing that we have a little gap between now and Champions, we will have to adjust our focus on individual practice and the overall theme of our gameplay,” he said in the weeks following the team’s exit from Masters.

Without the pressure of having to counterstrat a new team every week, DRX can once again work on recapturing their identity as a team. Known for their coordinated and calculated team play, hopefully, the players will be able to get their signature style back, and that can happen with either Foxy9 or Zest in the lineup.

Regardless of how they perform at Champions, head coach termi recognizes the stress all of the players have been under this season, and vowed to make changes so DRX can continue to perform at the highest level, without breaking down.

“Next season we will take care of our players more and make sure they don’t burn out,” termi said.

For now, focus is set on Champions, and though they are no longer outright favorites from the Pacific League, DRX can still finish with a result to would be proud of.