IMT Inero: "I hate working in a passive team. I want us to be active and make plays"

Inero discusses his return to the LCS with Immortals, the challenges of adapting to a new roster, and his goals for the team. He also shares insights from coaching in the NA CL and reuniting with former player Olleh.

Nicholas "Inero" Smith before the start of the League of Legends - Mid-Season Invitational 2023

"I hate to do it to Licorice, but Dignitas is the one team I want to beat."

With the LCS 2024 Summer Season just around the corner, Inero, the new head coach of Immortals, shares his thoughts in this League of Legends esports exclusive interview, recorded on June 5th during the LCS Asset Days. In this piece, the veteran coach discusses his excitement to re-enter the league, adapting to a new roster, and his goals for Immortals in the near future.

Are you excited to rejoin the LCS again?

Nicholas "Inero" Smith: "Yeah! I'm super excited. Not competing is not fun. So, I'm pretty pumped to be back into it. I've been dying to get back into everything.

You've been with the team for about a month and a half, right?

Inero: Just a month right now. I didn't start until May. May 1st was my first day and then our first scrim set was May 4th.

What are the first things you noticed this team was lacking upon joining?

Inero: Yeah, so coming in, one of the biggest things I noticed when doing interviews with the players was that there weren't consistent and clear team play happening. Their plays felt very individually focused, like one person doing this, another person doing that, rather than the team looking to do things together. It's always hard to figure out what causes these issues when coming from an outside perspective, so a lot of my focus has been turned towards getting them on the same page and making sure that they actively think of what to do in-game as a squad.

I've been creating and explaining concepts, trying to simplify things for them so they can all understand each other, which we've made a lot of good progress on. There's a lot to catch up on, especially as we're now working on certain fundamentals which other teams have acquired about four or five months ago. So yeah, I'm just trying to catch them up to speed on that sort of things but I think that if they can get on that same page, they can form a really strong team. They definitely have the individual skills and, it's just about putting it all together.

You are going to be reuniting with Olleh. How has it been working with him again? Has he changed from his Golden Guardians days?

Inero: He's not that different from before to be honest with you. Olleh is one of the most interesting people you will ever work with and coach. He can often find angles that only he can see, but sometimes he tunnel visions on them a bit too much. Everyone's got their pros and cons and, this guy likes to fight, knows how to fight, and will make them happen. It's really fun working with him, I like it a lot.

Immortals, competing in the 2024 LCS Spring Season. Credit: Robert Paul/Riot Games

If you have a team with Olleh on it, you're never going to have a passive team. He will simply not allow you to be passive, which is great because I hate working in a passive team. I want us to be active on the map together and constantly make plays. I want our enemies to feel pressured at all times. A lot of the things we're currently working on are related to that. Joo-sung is also just a funny guy as well... He always brings the mood up.

You've stayed more than five years with Golden Guardians. How do you see your future with Immortals? Do you plan on sticking with this organization in the long term?

Inero: I'm definitely used to this kind of situation where I come in, the team is kind of in the slums, and we have to work our way out of it. I'm not really uncomfortable with this, because I know that can be very stressful, but it's pretty chill for me since I'm used to leading underdogs. I managed to do it with Echo Fox and, before leaving Golden Guardians, we had to do it twice as well. It's hard, but it is very rewarding and feels great to do. And I really empathize with the players in this type of position because I know the stress that they're under.

I like turning things around and bringing a positive outcome to struggling teams. I'm really hopeful that I can achieve that with Immortals. I have no clue about my long-term future with them since my contract with them expires at the end of the year though. I'm still exploring different routes and opportunities with the Golden State Warriors, as I'm still an employee for them, and figuring out what will come from that. I'll have to decide if I want to pursue opportunities there or keep pushing in the LoL competitive landscape. Right now, it's really hard to say, but I want to treat the time that I'll spend with Immortals as if it were a long-term project. This is what we're looking to do: we want to build up this squad and prove that Immortals can compete.

Inero, previously general manager and coach for Golden Guardians. Credit: Colin Young-Wolff/Riot Games

Most recently, you operated as a general manager in the LCS for a full year. Even if you coached Disguised in Spring, could you tell us about your experience getting back into coaching?

Inero: It's been pretty easy to get back into honestly. I felt that managing a team was really straightforward and overall pretty easy. General managers have a lot of free time, as long as they're on top of their stuff basically. There are a lot of things I could have done better overall and it was a good learning experience, but in terms of time availabilities, I always had time to keep up with the team and help out in other ways as well.

Thankfully, I didn't really need to do much as we had some very talented coaches. Usually, I would just sit in, talk with them a bit, give some of my perspectives when necessary, and listen along. I don't feel like I was left too far behind and right now, it doesn't feel like I was away from that role for a year and have to catch up. I've always stayed pretty active and in sync with my previous players because it's something I've always valued. Overall, it hasn't been too difficult getting back into this role. Working in the NACL was honestly the hardest experience in my recent career though for different reasons. Working remotely is not the most thrilling experience and, I'm happy to be back now.

Can you tell us about your time in the NACL with Disguised? What have you learned with the team?

Inero: Working with Disguised was great. The main challenge was coaching remotely as everyone were in different time zones and having different real-life schedules. No one was making a full-time wage, so they couldn't just sit there and do this all day. Thankfully, there were also players like Tenacity and Poome who had a lot more time to help out. Poome in particular was doing collegiate on the side, so he had a lot more time to focus on League of Legends outside of his school hours.

Disguised, previously champions of the NACL in 2023. Credit: Stefan Wisnoski/Riot Games

It was really hard to get everybody to do stuff together, to see what they're thinking when everything's remote, to see their body language, all that stuff—it just doesn't exist. We turned on cameras sometimes, but it's not the same. So that was all really difficult, but I got used to it. It was a good experience. The environment was great. Our team started off kind of rough at first, which is usually what happens with a brand-new group of five people. We turned it around for playoffs. We should have been top three, but you know... unfortunate things happened in two of our games, it is what it is. I think for the younger guys on the team, it was a really good experience for them to learn from more veteran players and it's what I envisioned for this squad, so I'm quite happy.

Are there players from the NACL you would like to shout out as potential future LCS talents?

Inero: First of all, Quad coming up, that guy definitely has the talent, so I hope he does well in the LCS. I hope he doesn't suffer from the pressure put on him. He's good for sure and I want to see him play well. Aside from him though, I think the players on our team—I loved working with them. Tenacity is a bit of a little shit, but he's good. He's really funny and it was great to have him for our team environment. He cares, but he also keeps it fun for everyone. The same goes for Poome.

I really respect how Poome worked with Minui and helped him step up his game. Minui has a lot of stuff he needed to work on but he had a great mentor in Disguised. Poome really had this balance of complimenting good plays and being honest when his duo did bad things as well. He wouldn't refrain from just telling him: "Hey man, if you don't do this shit, it's not gonna work. You have to do that". I feel like Minui learned a lot from his leadership.

Inero, standing with his previous teammate Licorice. Credit: Colin Young-Wolff/Riot Games

Perry also feel like he grew a lot from this experience, even if he retired. I appreciate the work ethic he was willing to put into everything, even if we knew that he was not going to stay and pursue this career quite early on. Despite knowing that he would not continue his pro career, he put everything to work as hard as possible and pushed the rest of the team forward. He always cared so much about everything related to the game. He came in with plans and was always trying to find more things to help us do better.

Last but not least, we already had Young in Golden Guardians, so I was really excited to work with him again. He's a really talented kid. I hope he manages to find his way as well since he definitely has the skills to make it to the LCS. He's just gotta keep working on a few things and learn from others, which will come with time. I really loved working with all of them and it was just a really great experience. I wish I could have done it all in person. It's probably my biggest regret because we would have done amazing stuff together in person.

As you will be facing a lot of your ex-players this split, what team are you looking forward to taking down the most?

Inero: I think my only rivalry is with Dignitas... I hate to do it to Licorice, but that is one team I really wanna beat. I hope that everybody will play well and, I don't want to make anyone look bad... but they'll have to lose out in the end. I want them to lose, but I want them to look good while doing so. But yeah jokes aside, Dignitas is the team to beat in my eyes. I just don't mess with their management. I like Toby and their staff, but they are our rivals."

Header Credit Photo: Colin Young-Wolff/Riot Games