One of the most successful professional Call of Duty players, Nadeshot proves that esports can be very profitable if you have what it takes. Former Call of Duty champion is now retired and currently owns his own team, called 100 Thieves, which, besides Call of Duty, also competes in League of Legends, Clash Royale and Fortnite.
Nadeshot was born Matthew Haag in Palos Hills, Illinois, on August 3rd, 1992. His father was a carpenter and he has an older brother and a sister. Nadeshot graduated from Amos Alonzo Stagg High School in Palos Hills and attended Moraine Valley Community College. He finished a two years course in business studies. Before starting playing video games professionally, he worked at McDonald’s.
Nadeshot handle was originally spelled NaDeSHoT. It was a reference to the lethal move in Halo game, called grenade shot. A player would toss a grenade at the opponent and immediately followed it with a gunshot.
His first brush with competitive gaming was with Halo 2 and later Gears of War. He tried to qualify for MLG Chicago in 2007 but failed, although by a small margin. When he was 16, he decided to switch to Call of Duty and has never looked back.
At first, he wasn’t very successful at Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. His team, Genesis, didn’t work out for him and he transferred to OpTic Clan in 2010, around the time he graduated high school. He wasn’t in the lineup for Call of Duty: Black Ops in 2011 but was called as a replacement for a sick player at Major League Gaming Dallas in the same year.
With no practice, he finished third in the tournament. After finishing 6th at Major League Gaming Columbus 2011, he was released from the team and he went on to join Team EnVyUs. During that season, he had two more top eight placements at various tournaments, which was enough to earn a call to return to OpTic for Call of Duty Modern Warfare season.
The OpTic squad, consisting of Nadeshot, MerK, BigTymeR, and Vengeance, was very successful and won Call of Duty XP.
OpTic had a very successful 2012-13 season. They become the first Call of Duty: Black Ops II champions at the end of the season and team members were flushed with money.
The next season wasn’t nearly as good. First, MLG announced that the Call of Duty: Ghosts will be their featured FPS title for the upcoming season. Nadeshot and OpTic had a very bad start, ending outside top ten at the first two tournaments. The reason were team roster changes, which marred the entire season. They managed to somewhat recover and end up in the top three at the end, which brought Nadeshot $30,000 in prize money. He was also voted by fans as The Game Awards 2014 eSports Player of the Year.
The 2014-15 season saw Nadeshot become the captain of the OpTic team. He led his team successfully, winning the Pro League Season 1, but in April of 2015, he announced that he is stepping down as the captain and that he will be leaving OpTic. At the end of that season, he retired from gaming and become a co-owner of OpTic and content creator. In 2016 he left OpTic for good and created his own team, called 100 Thieves. They have been one of only three teams from North America competing in 2018 League of Legends World Championship in South Korea.
Apart from tournaments and sponsors during his playing career, Nadeshot earns an income stream from his social media presence. He is well-established on all platforms. On Facebook, he has over 500,000 fans. On Instagram, about 1,000,000 people follow him, plus an additional 2 million on Twitter. His main source of income is YouTube. With almost 3 million subscribers, his channel is one of the most popular gaming channels out there. According to Nailbuzz, all this brings him about $100,000 a year. Add in the salary he draws from 100 Thieves as CEO and Nadeshot makes a comfortable living.
Nadeshot estimated net worth in 2019 was around $2 million, and he is expected to maintain it in 2020 as well, perhaps adding a few bucks to that figure.