Cover-Credits:
FPS (First Person Shooter) veteran Spencer “Hiko” Martin announced his retirement from competitive Valorant according to a social media post by 100 Thieves. The player will continue to be a part of 100 Thieves’ content creators team but he will no longer be competing with the active Valorant roster in the Valorant Champions Tour. The 32-year-old player has been a popular figure in CS:GO and Valorant and he will continue his journey as a streamer on Twitch.
Hiko’s two-year journey in Valorant
Hiko was a football, hockey and baseball player but a hockey injury forced him out of sports. That is when he started getting into gaming and eventually competed in Counter-Strike events. After Riot Games released Valorant in 2020, Hiko switched to the game and quickly became one of the top streamers on Twitch in the Valorant category.
100 Thieves’ North American Valorant roster in 2020 was regarded as one of the best in the region. The team won First Strike North America but once the Valorant Champions Tour commenced, the team slowly fell off. 100 Thieves made it to Masters Berlin and the Last Chance Qualifiers but it failed to qualify for the world championship on both occasions.
While his competitive career in Valorant might not have been the most successful, Hiko’s streaming career has been rewarding for the player. He has over 1.5 million followers on Twitch as well as 1,500 active subscribers. In 100 Thieves’ social media post, Hiko said, “Now that I have a lot more free time, I plan on dedicating all of my focus and all of my energy into streaming, and creating unique and new content you guys haven’t seen me in before.”
The team had an abysmal start to the 2022 competitive circuit and the organization has almost overhauled the roster over the past few months. Ethan “Ethan” Arnold and Peter “Asuna” Mazuryk are the only two players left on the roster and they have been with Hiko since the very beginning. 100 Thieves is currently fielding Sean “bang” Bezerra from TSM on loan and it still needs to find two more players for Stage Two of the Valorant Champions Tour this year.
