1- SPICA WON WITH AMUMU.
With their win over C9 on Friday, FlyQuest became the only remaining unbeaten team in the LCS. Also, with the way they dismantled C9 13 kills to 2, it raises the question of how big the gap is between FLY and everyone else. The historically dominant regular season teams in LCS history are 2020 Spring C9, 2016 Summer TSM, and 2016 Spring IMT. C9 went 17-1, TSM went 17-1 (in Bo3) and IMT also went 17-1. It’s obviously too early to start comparing FLY to those regular season titans, but if they continue to put up performances like they did against C9… the comparisons will start looking more valid.
2- I’ll be the first one to say that I’m not that upset with C9’s loss to FlyQuest. I think it’s the kind of loss that isn’t that damning to the overall skill of the team. For instance, I thought the early jungle plan of Blaber’s Vi vs. Spica’s Amumu was solid and granted Blaber a 1 level lead. With the lead though, they lost a 2v2 mid lane which granted VicLa a double kill and a ton of gold on Sylas.
From there, FLY grew a moderate lead until C9 tried to force a kill onto Spica’s Amumu again at 20 minutes. Spica narrowly lived thanks to a recently completed Radiant Virtue, and then FLY was able to take the recently spawned Baron after the fight. So yes, C9 did lose handily, but I think they were somewhat unlucky in how impactful their misplays ended up being in the FLY game. Personally I’m still confident that this team can compete with FLY.
Also, wow, Diplex looks a lot like Sneaky.
3- FBI is really good. Like, really, really good. I think because Danny was so exceptional in teamfights and EG found so much success with him, the acquisition of FBI wasn’t met with much fanfare during the off-season. But through 4 games, FBI has posted a scoreline of 24/3/24, which gives him a KDA of 16. More importantly he’s been dominating the lane phase. With a Gold Difference @10 of +566. For reference, Danny’s GD@10 in 2022 Summer was +138. It’s yet to be seen if FBI can match Danny’s success in teamfights with EG, but I think it’s been shown that he can surpass him in lane.
4- Bjergsen leaving TSM and signing with TL in 2022 was a REALLY BIG DEAL. Looking back it’s pretty remarkable how muted the performance was and how quietly he left the team to join up with 100T. [In a recent interview by Carver Fisher of Dextero][1], Bjergsen said:
“The reality is that I was on a team that was supposed to be great and I didn’t do well. So, I need to prove that I wasn’t the problem and show why I’m so great.”
I think Bjergsen vs. TL is one of the most exciting storylines heading into Week 3. So far in 2023, Bjergsen’s performance has been… Bjergsen-like. He’s posting a small but consistent advantage in the laning phase, and he has the highest KDA of all mid laners at 9.6.
[1]: https://www.dexerto.com/league-of-legends/bjergsen-out-to-prove-his-worth-with-100-thieves-im-not-here-to-f-around-2051825/
5- The surprise stars of Week 1 definitely fell back to earth in Week 2 by losing both games (vs. EG and 100T). What was the difference?
The most obvious difference was how TSM didn’t have more scaling than their opponents in either matchup. This was particularly noticeable when Doublelift was able to slaughter them with his Zeri who was backed up by Lulu and Zilean.
I think beyond the scaling drafts, the bigger issue for TSM is their absolutely horrendous early game. They are averaging -3.6k gold at 15 minutes and haven’t held a “major lead” in any of their games this split. Even with the two Week 1 wins, no team can consistently perform when they are exiting laning phase with such massive deficits.
6- What an obnoxious team to try and be a fan of, I’m sorry. First they get underrated by every analyst in the offseason, then they start 0-2 and get *nearly* everyone to at least partially flip flop and praise CLG for their continuity and improvements year over year. Then… they 0-2 lose to Cloud9 and Immortals. COME ON, CLG. **It continues to be true that CLG performs in opposition to their expectations.** They tried to play double melee solo lanes vs. IMT, with Dhokla on Gwen and Palafox on Irelia. Versus. C9 they tried the double enchanter bot lane which works in theory but they fell too far behind.
I think it’s safe to say with games vs. GG and TSM upcoming in Week 3 for CLG…. they’ll go 0-2 again.
7- TL needed to bounce back in a big way after an incredibly disappointing 0-2 Week 1. In their first game of the week against Immortals they played decently. They cleverly took Lucian away from IMT after IMT first picked Nami (to break up the Lucian Nami pair) and then smashed bot lane with Lucian Sona. On the top side, Summit tried to play extremely aggressive with Renekton and… was frequently punished. TL still managed to win thanks to their bot lane being so damn far ahead.
In their 2nd game vs, Golden Guardians it was actually Summit’s Aatrox who jumped extremely far ahead the curve of the game after dominating Licorice’s Gragas. Unfortunately though, Team Liquid lacked the coordination to achieve a quick victory and only managed to squeak out a 40 minute victory. I think overall TL should be happy with the 2-0, but unhappy with the way they played. Hopefully the positive vibes from winning a couple games can carry over into some Week 3 improvements in play.
8- They won a game! Many may have missed it as it was the last game of the weekend, but it was in fact an upset win over CLG. All things considered, IMT played a rather standard team composition and had a pretty standard victory – which signifies real progress for this team. In Week 1, IMT jumped out to an early game lead against TSM only to give up nearly every dragon and lose handily. In Week 2 they managed to nurse their small lead, make very few mistakes, and grab a dragon soul en route to a solid victory.
Week 3 is a real opportunity for IMT. If they can pick up wins against the currently winless Dignitas and Golden Guardians, people will have to start thinking about IMT differently.
9- I really fear for this team’s mental. They’ve lost all 4 of their games and they haven’t been close. In particular, in their game against EG, Jensen got 3-man ganked at level 1 which burned his flash and set him behind in the game. Normally, if the enemy team commits that many resources to mid lane you can gain an advantage elsewhere. That wasn’t the case for Dignitas as EG’s bot lane easily recovered the lost pressure and still managed to have a great game.
I think the problems for DIG start in the bottom lane. They are consistently losing lane, and now teams are sending their resources preemptively elsewhere to make sure mid or top lane can’t beat them either. This could definitely be a symptom of Visa issues and limited practice. Unlike most teams, Dignitas had almost no practice before the start of the split. Let’s just hope they can hold it together while they continue to gain familiarity with each other.
10- Golden Guardians is in 10th place. They’ve lost all 4 games. They’ve lost to EG, C9, FLY, and TL. On paper, those are 4 of the strongest teams in the league. Golden Guardians ranks 8th in Gold Difference at 15. They rank 6th in kills. It’s really hard to judge their actual strength because they’ve technically lost all of the games they should have lost *on paper*. Only in Week 3 will they be facing opponents who they should be beating *on paper.*
GG definitely drew the hard teams first, but will be facing CLG and IMT in Week 3, and then TSM, DIG, and 100T in Week 4. I don’t expect GG to be contending for a title, but I do expect them to start winning some games.
