Paper Rex officially bench fan

No dinosaur costumes in Tokyo.

Just last weekend, on May 28th, Malaysia-Singapore's Paper Rex took home the VCT Pacific League's inaugural trophy and were crowned the VALORANT champions of their region.

However, the team accomplished this feat without one of their most well-known players, and the league MVP trophy went to their newest player, something. The team looked fantastic with their new addition this season, but this leaves one veteran left behind when Paper Rex travel to Masters Tokyo next week.

On Sunday afternoon Korean time, Paper Rex announced via a lengthy tweet that the team would officially move Benkai to the inactive roster.

🇰🇷 SEOUL, South Korea — In its continued effort to stabilize its VALORANT roster, Paper Rex has made the difficult decision to move Benedict ‘Benkai’ Tan from the starting roster to bench status.Benedict has been with the team throughout the VCT Pacific season and contributed… pic.twitter.com/1V8gHk8og6

Benkai captured hearts everywhere all the way back at Paper Rex's first international appearance at VCT Masters Berlin in 2021. Throughout the 2022 season, he continued to connect with fans through his in-game leadership and fun antics. From walking onstage dressed in a Tyrannosaurus Rex costume to pulling fun pranks on his teammates, Benkai always lit up the atmosphere.

Benkai started the 2023 season on Paper Rex's starting roster and played with the team in LOCK//IN, the first big international tournament of the year. Just before the start of the VCT Pacific league, Paper Rex made a huge move in signing something, the Russian player who had proved himself previously in the Japanese VALORANT scene.

Something seemed like he could be a great addition to the team, but the question remained: which one of Paper Rex's other talented players would sit out?

While all partnered VCT teams must have six players on their roster, the sixth player often serves as a true substitute. For Paper Rex, the first few weeks of the season were spent figuring out how their roster would adjust to this.

Benkai played his last match with the team on April 15th, where they lost 13-5 on Ascent against DRX. He was substituted for the next map, which was then played by what would become Paper Rex's ultimate starting roster—f0rsakeN, mindfreak, Jingg, d4v41, and something.

This roster went on to play DRX twice after the match on April 15th, beating the Korean team both times and taking home the VCT Pacific League trophy.

Though Benkai is now on the inactive roster—meaning he will not be traveling with Paper Rex to compete in Tokyo later this month—the team is still required by the VCT to have six players on their roster. Their new sixth player is CGRS, who has been signed with the team since October 2022. He has played two official matches with the team since then.

In their Tweet, Paper Rex also mentioned that something may not have his travel documents prepared in time for him to play during the team's opening matches in Japan. The team is preparing for CGRS to step in if needed.

Nadine is currently a student at the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. She covers VALORANT and Overwatch with a focus on the Asia-Pacific region and marginalized genders in esports. Before joining Dot Esports as a freelance writer, she interned at Gen.G Esports and the Star Tribune in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Her favorite Pokémon is Quagsire.