Graduated Gamers: Matt “Cubby” Samuelson
The beginning of Spring Break ushers in graduation season at Miami University, and with this year’s graduation season the Miami University Varsity Program wanted to pay homage to our alumni working their way through the esports world as we used out a new class of seniors. First of these alumni is someone I personally got to work with, Matt “Cubby” Sameulson. I caught up with Cubby earlier in the semester so that I could share everything going on in his post graduation life. But before I can get into that let me fill you in on who Cubby was before.
His Backstory
A Chicagoland native Cubby is part of the Class of 2018 and a cofounder of the very Varsity program I call home. While attending Miami he studied Marketing with an IMS minor choosing to focus on digital marketing. Cubby was always into gaming, whether it was casual games in Zoo Tycoon or the Backyard game series, or competitive gaming in Call of Duty Black Ops and Modern Warfare 3. It wasn’t until his introduction to League of Legends by his cousin in highschool that his attitude surrounding gaming changed and it was Miami that offered him the first opportunity to experience this change. While attending Miami Cubby became both a cofounder for the Varsity Program and a member of our League of Legends roster. Without Cubby and the rest of the founding members I wouldn’t have this platform.
How I met him
Coming out of college Cubby ended up working for a startup whose founder he connected with during the San Francisco study abroad program. And how he describes it he became the marketing lead for a 10 person company doing whatever they needed whenever they needed. This worked out for about a year but it was Covid that brought Cubby back to Miami. After losing his job due to the virus he struggled a bit to find work. In his now growing free time he turned back to the world of competitive League of Legends. After listening to countless hours of casting vods he came to the conclusion that many color commentators in the industry at the time were not up to snuff and he was confident that he could learn to be better. It was around that same time that the League team noticed it could use a more unified voice or a coach to drive discussion in the pre and post game. Recognizing an opportunity to not only improve himself but give back to Miami once again Cubby took the job. Looking back on that time he admits that he wasn’t the best at it, but I know that everyone on the team including myself had plenty to take away to grow ourselves as players and leaders.
Present towards the future
After climbing through five of the six major amateur tournament organizers Cubby got the call to work with Riot at the end of the 2021 LCS Academy Spring split. As expected he impressed so much so that they asked him back for the Circuit and Academy that summer. Then finally, after a a year of hard work and dedication to improvement in 2022 they kept him on to be one of the fulltime faces of Academy League of Legends in North America. For Cubby casting and commentary is more than just delivering the storyline of the match to his audience, its an opportunity to help represent players and coaches to their audience through the intricacies of their play and choices and delve deeper into the meanings behind their actions from an outside point of view. As for what the future looks like to him, its one of two paths. Either as a fulltime LCS caster or working with one of the LCS teams specifically.
I want to thank Cubby for taking the time to answer my questions and I wish him good luck in the roads ahead. If you are interested in hearing more from him you can see him weekly on the NA Challenger Stream and on twitter @Cubbyxx..
