100TALK - 100 Thieves Podcast · @100talkpod
13th Mar 2023 from TwitLonger
The dads are saying goodbye: 100Talk to conclude after LCS spring split
After 5 extremely fun years, 100Talk is winding down at the conclusion of the LCS spring split.
The schedule for actually ending the show is in flux a bit given the uncertainty around playoffs and the fact that Jordan will be out of the country on business at the end of March and beginning of April. What it boils down to is that our last regular episode of 100Talk will happen on Monday, 3/20 if 100T fails to make playoffs, or Monday 4/10 if they make it in. Our final Rec League stream will be on Thursday, 4/13, and we’ll say our final goodbyes during a special farewell stream on Monday, 4/17.
The various 100Talk channels and accounts will remain public. We anticipate periodic tweets and perhaps even the rare celebratory Twitch stream to still be a thing, but any sort of regular activity won’t continue. If you are interested in keeping up with us individually, you can follow Cole (@coleisenbarger | https://twitter.com/coleisenbarger) and Jordan (@jordan_whicker | https://twitter.com/jordan_whicker). We don’t tweet much from our individual accounts, but Cole is a little addicted to Twitter so you will probably see his account activity pick up.
We started 100Talk in June of 2018 as a space for fun, reasonable, and mature discussion of 100 Thieves esports, favoring patience and nuance over flame and hot takes. We are extremely proud of the approach we took and the character of the community that formed around us. We had no idea that we would be able to count so many high-caliber individuals as listeners and friends. It is our heartfelt belief that 100Talkers truly are the cream of the LCS fan crop.
Rumors of Jordan and Cole being boomers have not been greatly exaggerated - we are old and getting older. Since the beginning of 100Talk, our careers and families have developed rapidly and today we find ourselves stretched rather thin across our various priorities. You know us as “the 100Talk dads,” and as committed as we are to you 100Kids, we are even more fiercely committed to our biological children. We’d be fools to not make the absolute most of the precious time we have with them. So that’s what we’ll be doing: stepping away from our lovely fan community to ensure we are being there as much as possible for our families while balancing the growing demands of our jobs.
It’s very difficult to step away. 100Talk has been a vehicle for some unbelievable memories. We casted some of 100T’s LCS Academy matches and got roasted for 45 minutes straight during an extended tech pause. We streamed a tour of the 100Talk Bring the Buff LA Content Apartment Los Angeles. After COVID put LCS on a pause, we had 100T staff captain teams in the Someoner’s Cup tournament. We had a streaming session from the Compound’s streaming pods. We repeatedly owned Team Liquid’s twitter account. Our listeners virtually taped our eyelids open and forced us to watch Arcane on stream. We rallied the community to Trust the Papa all the way to our first LCS title - which was celebrated with a live call-in on stream by Nadeshot and the rest of the 100T staff. We agonized over spoilers during VOD Squad streams. We became - by far - the worst ASMR streamers on Twitch to kick off every Rec League. We invented the best show format ever with Talk Trios and only got to use it like three times. Jordan taught us the signs of a stroke while we “Fast Pought Last Wought.” We read monologues on Diary of an NA fan that somehow both mourned and glorified our region’s anemic performance at Worlds. We broke bread with friends we’d never met in person at Worlds in Atlanta. We talked everyone through the many hard times and celebrated the many incredible times. It’s been a fantastic run and that makes this decision a rather painful one.
There are, of course, too many people to thank for their support and contributions along the way. To the 100 Thieves OGs who were so welcoming and generous with their time and resources (you guys know exactly who you are) - thank you. It was truly incredible how much you care about our small corner of the 100T fanbase. We are so fortunate to have chosen the right org.
Also a huge thanks for staff, players, and coaches who participated in interviews, podcast episodes, Rec League matches, social media interactions, and more.
To our excellent Discord and Twitch mods - thank you for helping us to uphold our community values (even our much-maligned “no politics” policy!) and for creating a warm and welcoming space. Thank you for always being present and participating. You were more important to our community than you know.
Long-time 100Talk fans will remember the incredible generosity of some of our early supporters who blew us away with gifted subs and donations that enabled us to do so many giveaways and content trips. You also brought the best community vibes and drew so many wonderful people into our circle. It was a real kickstarter for our channels. Many of the top sub gifters are memorialized in the 100Talk Treasury of Gifts and Subs (https://www.twitch.tv/100talkpod/about - scroll down a bit). You guys are the greatest.
Thank you also to our generous sponsors - Elgato hugely upped our stream quality out of the kindness of their hearts. We were fans of their products already, and give them our highest endorsement. They sincerely care about streamers. Rip It Energy Fuel has been our favorite energy drink since we first encountered it in the early 2000s. Having them sign on as an in-kind sponsor felt like a childhood dream come true. Special shoutout to HoodieGod / Eleven for making that sponsorship possible, and an extra shoutout to longtime 100Talk fan Mont who programmed a Rip It-themed video game(!!!) we played on stream. Insanity.
A very special thank you to the other LCS fan podcasts in the space, both past and present. We enjoyed sharing tips and experience, crossing over our communities, and all of the banter over the years. We have a shared, special understanding of just how challenging this particular content niche is. To do it consistently, you really have to love it. We hope that our community members will continue to support you.
And of course, the biggest possible thank you to our community at large. If we’ve learned anything during this whole experience, it’s that community-building is a gigantic team effort. As anyone who has ever pressed a “go live” button knows, a streamer’s worst fear is a lonely, empty chat. Fortunately, we did not have to endure that for very long. To this day, we still remember our first-ever commenter on stream (shoutout Kien Tran aka Koragon: @KienTran310). Things quickly blossomed from there and our community has been a rich source of jokes, podcast lore, camaraderie, esports intelligence, and more. We’re thankful for every one of you, whether you sponsored a themed Rec League stream, sent us 100Talk needlepoint artwork, embroidered the 100Talk logo on a hoodie, created real jerseys for our imaginary Rec League, built us a bear, made a documentary about our silly League of Legends gameplay, won the prestigious Most Entertaining Player award, contributed ideas to the god-forsaken skin locker (absolutely horrible name), made Jordan read Elgato product manuals in foreign languages, or just said literally anything in chat. Many of you have become good friends. It’s the best group we could ever have asked for.
***Quick note from Jordan***
Everything you think of when you think of 100Talk is thanks to Cole. I’m not exaggerating, here. I will take credit for introducing Cole to 100 Thieves and League in 2018, but from that point forward, he’s been the engine behind this thing. So, let me just add my own personal thanks to him. My goal was to find someone to talk to about League esports. Safe to say I ended up gaining a lot more than that.
***Quick note from Cole***
Every once in a while, people DM me saying they’re thinking about starting a podcast and ask if I have any advice for them. I always say the same exact thing: find a great co-host. It keeps you accountable and adds a dynamism to your content that is impossible to get otherwise. I’m convinced that there’s no one else in the world who could possibly have made a better copilot than Jordan. He is smart, fun, insightful, creative, supportive, and probably most important of all - consistent. Showing up for 1-3 streams per week for a period of five years is not a trivial accomplishment. There is absolutely no way I would have been able to manage the show alone, not to mention that streams would have been infinitely less entertaining without his continuous influx of ideas and energy. Don’t listen to him when he says it was all me - we all know that’s not true!
Jordan and I have been friends since we were six years old and have never gotten tired of each other. Friendships like that are rare and invaluable. If you are lucky enough to find one, do everything in your power to hold on to it - even if it means you have to create a silly podcast in a very narrow niche that may never be listened to. If 100Talk accomplished nothing else, at least it meant I had a regularly-scheduled time to talk with my friend.
As we always say at this time: we love you, and we miss you already. Take care.