Sentinels sign former G2 initiator JonahP ahead of VCT Americas Stage 1

Eleven days after the change of their head coach was reported, Sentinels have changed a player. The organization announced that JonahP has joined its 2026 Valorant Champions Tour roster ahead of VCT Americas Stage 1, Esports Insider reported on March 6, 2026. The organization made the signing public in a post on X.

JonahP comes from G2 Esports, the team that won all three regional competitions of VCT Americas in 2025 and that removed him from its roster before the 2026 season. He plays initiator, the role built around abilities that reveal where opponents are and open the way for teammates. Sentinels' chief executive, Rob Moore, had said in February that the team would most likely make two roster changes before Stage 1. This is the first of them to be announced.

What Sentinels announced, and what it did not

The announcement covers one arrival. JonahP joins the main roster for the 2026 season, in time for Stage 1, the first of the year's two league phases. Esports Insider gives no fee, no contract length and no other term. It does not describe a deal between two clubs either: G2 Esports had parted ways with the player just before the season began, according to the outlet.

The roster the outlet lists after the signing has five players. The in-game leader, the player who calls the team's tactics during a match, is johnqt. Around him are N4RRATE, cortezia, reduxx and JonahP. Martin "Ewok" van der Walt is head coach and Luke "GUNTER" Clives is assistant coach.

A team fields five players, and Sentinels already had five. The organization has not said which of them makes way.

That is the limit of what is established about the other side of the move. A player missing from a listed five has not necessarily left the organization, and nothing has been published on where Kyu stands contractually.

The line-up, eleven days apart

Putting the two published rosters side by side shows how narrow the change is so far. Four players and both coaches appear on each list.

The February list was itself the product of a rebuild. In its overview of the 2026 rosters, Esports Insider recorded that Sentinels had parted ways with three players before the season, Zellsis, zekken and bang, and had brought in cortezia among its additions. The same overview placed Zellsis at Cloud9, zekken at MIBR and bang at 100 Thieves, three teams of the same league.

Why Sentinels were looking for players

The signing follows a difficult start to the year. Sentinels did not qualify for Masters Santiago, the first international tournament of the season, which was open to the top three teams of each regional Kickoff. The team also left the Americas Kickoff without any Championship Points, the points collected across the season that decide who goes to the world championship, Esports Insider reported on February 23.

That day the outlet reported that Sentinels had parted ways with head coach Adam "kaplan" Kaplan and hired Ewok, who had spent three years as head coach of RRQ in VCT Pacific, another of the circuit's international leagues. Moore explained the split on the live stream of Tarik "tarik" Celik. By his account the two sides disagreed over roster decisions: kaplan wanted to take the in-game leader role away from johnqt and to move zekken off the duelist role, the position of the player who goes in first. The coach's contract gave him the final say, and Moore said Sentinels would not give a head coach that authority again.

Moore also said the players themselves agreed the team needed changes. He announced that there would most likely be two more roster changes, with trials, sessions in which candidates play with the team before any contract is signed, starting the following Tuesday.

One position was named as open. Moore said N4RRATE would no longer be the team's primary duelist, and that the job would likely go to reduxx unless Sentinels signed a duelist from outside. JonahP's arrival does not answer that question: he is an initiator. If a second change follows, as Moore indicated, the duelist role is the one the chief executive has publicly put on the table.

What the move means for G2 Esports

For G2 Esports the story ended in the off-season. Esports Insider's overview of the 2026 rosters records that the organization chose not to renew JonahP's contract, a decision that the outlet says drew criticism from the community for its timing. A January report by the same outlet said the removal came ahead of the season and left the player little or no time to find a new team.

G2 gave his place to babybay. He had first played for the team as a stand-in, a temporary replacement, and was then added to the starting five with a contract through the end of 2027. G2's in-game leader, valyn, discussed the choice at the press conference before the Americas Kickoff, in remarks reported by Esports Insider on January 10. He described the decision as one made in the moment during a hectic off-season, said the team is always looking for small ways to improve, and called parting with JonahP a hard decision.

The team JonahP left had dominated the region with him. In 2025, G2 won the Americas Kickoff, Stage 1 and Stage 2, and finished second at Masters Bangkok after losing a best-of-five series to T1, according to the January report. The player had been with that core since before it wore G2's colors: with The Guard he won the North American Stage 1 Challengers in 2022 and Ascension Americas in 2023, the tournament that promotes a team to the league, and G2 took over that roster after The Guard left Valorant.

G2 is still playing while Sentinels rebuild. It is one of the three Americas teams in the Masters Santiago playoffs, where Esports Insider's schedule has it opening against All Gamers on March 7.

Group Omega and the Stage 1 format

The new line-up will be tested in a league phase whose groups are already known. Esports Insider reported on February 16 that the Stage 1 groups were drawn after the lower-bracket final of each region's Kickoff, from seeding pools based on Kickoff results. Sentinels landed in Group Omega with FURIA, NRG, 100 Thieves, Evil Geniuses and KRÜ Esports.

Each group is a single round robin, in which every team meets each of the others once. For Sentinels that means five matches. Two of the five opponents, FURIA and NRG, are in the Masters Santiago playoffs with G2, and NRG is the reigning world champion. A third, 100 Thieves, is the team where the roster overview placed bang.

G2 Esports was drawn in the other group, Alpha. JonahP will not meet his former team in the group stage; the two can only cross in the playoffs.

The format, as Esports Insider set it out in December 2025, sends the top four of each group of six to the Stage 1 Playoffs. The top three of those playoffs qualify for Masters London, scheduled for June 6 to 21.

The points Sentinels are chasing

Moore has been direct about the standings. In the remarks reported on February 23 he said Sentinels would most likely miss Champions Shanghai, the world championship of 2026, and that it would probably need to finish in the top two to qualify. The outlet noted that the team had taken no points from the Kickoff.

The points table explains the arithmetic. Teams earn one Championship Point for each match won in Stage 1 and in Stage 2. The larger amounts come from placing at the top of an event, and only the first four places score in the regional ones.

The first two bars are already out of reach for Sentinels: the Kickoff is over and the team is not in Santiago. What remains starts with Stage 1. Behind the winner, the Stage 1 Playoffs pay four points to the runner-up, three to third place and two to fourth.

Moore said the changes were also made with the 2027 season in mind, according to the February report, so the roster being assembled now is intended to outlast this year's race.

Five weeks to the first match

VCT Americas Stage 1 begins on April 10, Esports Insider reported in February. From the day the signing was reported, that leaves 35 days, exactly five weeks.

In that time Sentinels have to do several things at once. Ewok, a head coach whose hiring was reported on February 23, is preparing his first competition with the team. johnqt is listed as the in-game leader. A new initiator has to be fitted into a five that changed three players in the off-season, and the duelist role has been described by the chief executive as unsettled.

The season calendar then moves quickly. After the Stage 1 Playoffs and Masters London, Stage 2 runs from June 30 to August 16 and the Season Finals from August 5 to September 6, and Champions is scheduled in Shanghai from September 24 to October 18.

Two announcements are still awaited from Sentinels. One is the status of Kyu, about which the team has said nothing. The other is the second roster change, which Moore described as likely and which has not been made public.

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