Team Liquid has announced that it’s ‘stepping away from the fighting game ring,’ letting go of Alan ‘Nephew’ Sun and Marquis ‘Shadow’ Jordan.
“Shadow and Nephew played their hearts out over the last year and reached brand new heights,” Team Liquid stated on X. “Thank you so much to the Tekken and Street Fighter communities, and please keep supporting Shadow and Nephew as they move on to their next opportunities.”
On January 6th, Team Liquid tweeted that it was ‘bidding farewell’ to Nephew and Shadow, two of its fighting game players. This leaves Melee God Juan ‘Hungrybox’ DeBiedma as its only active fighting game pro. Hungrybox is a co-owner of the esports organisation.
“For now, we will be stepping out of the fighting game ring, but we know that the FGC is something special,” Team Liquid stated. “Few scenes embody the creativity, energy and communal spirit of competitive gaming like the fighting game community does and so, if we see a good opportunity to step back in, we will.”
Nephew and Shadow Leave Team Liquid
Nephew is a Street Fighter competitor who has been an FGC pro since 2021, starting off with Panda. After leaving a job at Google to pursue a career in esports, Nephew has proven to be a top talent in North America.
In 2025, he continued to prove his skills to the rest of the world, including a win at MIXUP and second-place finishes at other Tier 2 tournaments. However, he came up short in Tier 1 tournaments like the Esports World Cup, where he got 25th-36th, and Evo, placing in 65th-96th in Las Vegas and 17th-24th in France.
Shadow’s main game of choice is Tekken, and he’s been grinding the FGC scene since 2018. He was quite busy in 2025, dominating in Tier 2 competitions both in-person and online. Unfortunately, Shadow’s results were mixed in larger tournaments. He notably placed 7th-8th in Evo Japan but struggled in other Tier 1 events.
“The last 2 years on Team Liquid have been amazing, and I’m really proud of the results I had with them, thanks to their support,” Nephew stated on X.
