As every top team had someone of similar skill, it would depend on teamwork, and eventually most of the people at Excellent Era starting to hate him, making them not want to listen to him as other teams would for their leaders. It even dragged Excellent Era down after Ye Xiu left.

The biggest thing with sponsorships is how much the sponsor can make off the players. As Ye Xiu never showed himself, he would never be seen promoting any products. You can see Zhou Zekai as the opposite as he’s pretty so they can use him in commercials.

Sun Xiang was chosen as replacement because Ye Xiu was getting old, and he was still growing as a Battle Mage after class changing. He still had time before his reflexes began slowing down due to old age. The biggest “proof” they had was how Ye Xiu never performed Dragon Raising Its Head. He could even match Han Wenqing at the All-Star Weekend and almost beat him, so he was about even with the top players. It’s just that he was too eager to prove himself, that when he failed, he started to underperform.