No team, no drama: How DM silenced his doubters

Dmitry "DM" Dorokhin and Team Yandex wrote the most powerful storyline at the recently concluded PGL Wallachia Season 7.

Kicked from PARIVISION at the end of January, DM was still a free agent with nothing on his schedule as PGL Wallachia Season 7 was about to start on the 7th of March. His removal from the team remains quite controversial, as most of us still try to make sense of it or imagine what kind of misfit he was in the PARIVISION camp. Many agree that something outside the game triggered the changes for PVISION.

When they welcomed Valery "SSS" Lazarev, PARIVISION mentioned on their social media posts that “his hero pool will add variety” to their games. That alone made it sound like they needed a change in their drafts and gameplay. A change that perhaps DM was not willing to embrace.

However, fast-forward to Wallachia Season 7, and the stats tell a different story. What truly changed for PARIVISION is that they seem to be moving away from the fast-paced, hyper aggressive Dota, which brought them tournament trophies in the past, and a top three finish at The International 2025.

Interestingly enough, despite being eliminated in the Swiss group stage at Wallachia Season 7, PARIVISION still had the highest average game length. That’s an absurd stat given the fact that Team Liquid played a few marathon matches that went past the 70-minute mark. Even so, Liquid placed only third overall, but first among the teams that made it to the playoffs.

When it comes to hero pools, the reality was different from expectations.

DM vs SSS: What the numbers say

PGL Wallachia Season 7 was the first tournament where we had the chance to watch both PARIVISION with SSS in the offlane and DM playing with another team. DM arrived in Bucharest as a last-minute stand-in solution for Team Yandex, who couldn’t attend in full due to visa issues. Even so, he integrated so well into the Yandex line-up that he left the PGL Studios with a trophy in his hands.

In the group stage matches, he played 8 unique heroes, just as many as SSS, though he and Yandex played only 4 best-of-3 series in the Swiss format, while PARIVISION played 5.

Looking only at the group stage stats for DM and SSS, we discover that while the latter has a higher average GPM and XPP than DM, his impact on the game is way less visible.

While SSS’s GPM and XPM values on average might actually be a bit inflated due to the fact that his games were way longer than those of Team Yandex, the revealing stat is the KDA. DM, maintaining a higher KDA (6.15 vs 4.93), even with fewer games played through the group stage and with shorter average length, reveals a far better performance from him. Far more team fight involvement, more kills, fewer deaths.

If we are to look at the whole tournament, although it’s not exactly fair to compare them past the group stage, the hero pool goes in DM’s favour as well.

Overall, the stats, based on a larger sample size compared to SSS, paint DM as a stable offlaner with a solid performance over a longer series and more diverse matchups.

What comes next for SSS and DM?

Well, asked in the winner’s interview if he is open to discussions with any team that might be interested in signing him, DM’s answer came promptly. “I already have a team.” The next day, his former coach at PARIVISION, Filipe "Astini" Ribeiro announced that he has formed a line-up with DM and that the main objectives are qualifying for The International 2026 and Esports World Cup.

For SSS, the month is packed. From PGL Wallachia S7, he and PARIVISION are going straight to ESL One Birmingham, which could put extra pressure on the whole team. PARIVISION are the ESL defending champions, but their recent form is nothing like that of the PARIVISION who lifted the trophy in Raleigh last year.

ESL One Birmingham 2026 is set to start this coming Sunday, March 22nd, and for PARIVISION, a first realistic goal could be to make it to the playoffs, something they missed since the roster change.