At League of Legends, new times are dawning for Eintracht Spandau, the team of HandOfBlood. Last year, they acquired 25-year-old Johannes “Fun K3y” Werner, who was voted the most valuable player of the Prime League in the summer of 2023. With him, Eintracht became champions and European champions in LoL in 2024. But now Fun K3y has to go – he is replaced by Daniel “Broeki” Broekmann. He is 33, a Twitch streamer, and, as he says himself, “too old” for the 1st league in German LoL.
What is happening at Eintracht Spandau?
The team from Berlin won everything it could in Europe in 2024, if it didn’t buy into the LEC: They even won the EU Masters and celebrated it exuberantly in Berlin.
Originally, Spandau wanted to achieve something in the league with local players, carefully building them up, but that only led to frustration for HandOfBlood and his crew for years.
In 2024, they spent a lot of money and bought the best that the Prime League had to offer. They brought in players like “PowerOfEvil”, Tristan Schrage, a seasoned pro who had played for the top American team TSM and participated in World Championships. Furthermore, they signed players like Johannes “Fun K3y” Werner from the Unicorns of Love, the best players in the league.
Eintracht Spandau provided the players with apartments, hired a cook, a physiotherapist, and a coaching team including mental specialists. They provided everything that professionals in League of Legends need to perform at their best.
However, the team’s analysis after such a successful season is harsh: Sporting success is not worth it. Only reach and entertainment bring money.
While Eintracht Spandau wants to stay in the 1st league, they plan to rely on players who are already at the end of their sports careers and want to build a second pillar through content creation.
Their new ADC, Daniel Broekmann (33), fits perfectly: Broeki used to be a pro, but has long been a Twitch streamer and has been a content creator for Eintracht Spandau: He played the janitor in many videos or even portrayed people hopelessly stuck in the ELO hell of LoL (via YouTube).
Broeki’s goal: Don’t lose games alone
What does Broeki himself say about the opportunity? Broeki explains in a video on YouTube that he was surprised to become a LoL pro again at 33. He had long since concluded his career. He says he has won titles when many current players were not even born yet.
My record is not bad, but my record is more than 10 years old. So in terms of titles, I’m doing well in the German scene. No one can take that away from me. I also think that’s nice. However, very few players were born when I won titles.
When the offer came while he was eating, he spat out the food, and the whole restaurant stared at him, he tells.
Although he was involved in the Miracle Run as part of the streamer team NNO in 2022 and achieved promotion from the 2nd league to the 1st league, Broeki says that was already 2 years ago:
Today he is not 31 years old, but 33 years old, and perhaps he won’t be able to handle it all with the 1st league, and will throw in the towel after a few months, but he promises the fans to give his all.
Broeki is also not having it easy as a Twitch streamer, his girlfriend makes it as difficult as possible for him:
Broekmann says he knows that he will probably be the worst player in the league. But his goal is to at least not lose games alone. To achieve that, he will train very hard.
His new midlane partner, PowerOfEvil, is still one of the top 3 midlaners in the league even with minimal training; he can afford to slack off in training. But he himself will have to put in real effort, and he will do that.
The probability that I am the worst player is… probably quite high. And being the worst player in the team is not a cool trademark – in a world where viewers can’t reflect.
Broeki knows that by saying “I will be a pro again” he is taking a big risk for his Twitch career. One can quickly spiral down when constantly losing. But he loves the project and wants to see it through and find out once more.
Meanwhile, Fun K3y is looking for a new team:
What will happen to NNO? Broeki finds it difficult to say goodbye to NNO. He played with NoWay for almost 10 years, and it was important for him that he could always rely on him. An era is coming to an end.
Ultimately, Broeki also says he was a bit disappointed that NNO played together so rarely in recent years. The careers of everyone went towards streaming, and there was little time for the joint project.
Broeki still wants to attend the next Red Bull event when it is against T1; then he will step back from NNO. He seems to recommend to his streamer colleagues to replace him with Nico “Sola” Linke, who also plays botlane and is a no-brainer.
E-sports is no longer worth it
What’s behind this: The harsh analysis is that e-sports in LoL will change significantly by 2025. There will be considerably lower salaries for LoL players. There will likely only be a few places for full-time pros in LoL at all. Players like Broeki earn money by generating reach and will have to make do with lower salaries and infrastructure.
But who will take players like Fun K3y if 33-year-old Twitch streamers now occupy the spots and many teams withdraw completely from e-sports?
In North America, Riot Games will merge leagues; already, large organizations have left the stage in the USA. The LoL expert NoWay predicts something similar for Europe (via YouTube). Maybe Eintracht Spandau will still play a good role in the considerably weaker Prime League in 2025 with less effort and training hours and lower salaries, speculates the Twitch streamer.
For many, surprisingly: Eintracht Spandau, which has long been regarded as a flagship project in German e-sports, has now revealed that despite the best possible sporting success, they haven’t made a profit. So it’s not as if clubs have much choice now, when they are betting on Twitch streamers instead of full-time pros who want to live off e-sports.
What’s next for Eintracht Spandau? With PowerOfEvil and Broeki, midlane and ADC are filled. The other 3 positions are still open. As a “game-strong streamer,” Agurin would be a suitable choice for the jungle. That seems to be a dream solution for Broeki. But nothing is set in stone here: Many consider a German to be the best SoloQ player in LoL – How does Agurin play?
