swag quits competitive CS:GO

Braxton "⁠swag⁠" Pierce has announced that he has decided to take a step back from competitive Counter-Strike as he awaits the release of Project A.

In a Twitter post, the 23-year-old wrote that while he may still stream CS:GO in the future, his focus is now on Riot's upcoming tactical shooter as he looks to realize his ambition of "being the best in the world."

He quits Swole Identity with immediate effect, leaving the team without their top performer in ESEA MDL Season 33, in which he was averaging an impressive 1.43 rating.

swag burst onto the Counter-Strike scene in 2011, when he was named rookie of the season in ESEA Season 9. He quickly rose through the ranks and got his breakthrough in May 2013, when he signed for Quantic Gaming alongside Jordan "⁠n0thing⁠" Gilbert, Sean "⁠seang@res⁠" Gares, Spencer "⁠Hiko⁠" Martin and Kory "⁠SEMPHIS⁠" Friesen.

Later that year, swag attended the first Counter-Strike Major, DreamHack Winter 2013, where the team – who by then had joined Complexity – reached the semi-finals. He was released from that squad in March 2014 and joined iBUYPOWER, whom he would inspire to a runner-up finish at the FACEIT League Season 2 Finals, making an appearance in 2014's top 20 player of the year ranking at No.18.

In January 2015, he and three of his former iBUYPOWER teammates were among the seven people who were indefinitely banned from Valve's Major circuit for their role in a match-fixing scandal related to a CEVO match that had been played in August. A year later, Valve issued another statement clarifying that all bans handed out for match-fixing offenses were permanent.

swag went on to play for teams like GX, Torqued and Swole Patrol, attending a DreamHack Open event and several ESL Pro League tournaments on LAN after the two tournament organisers had lifted the indefinite bans for match-fixing cases issued prior to February 2015. He played his last LAN event at ESL Pro League Season 10 Americas, where Swole Patrol went out in last place.