In the interest of keeping things fresh and doing a pre-pre-playoff run check-in, I decided to do something a bit different this week. I'll be checking in and looking at what players [said about their own teams before the start of the split][1], and then comparing those thoughts to the current state of these teams.
There have been a lot of changes since then.
Let's get it. Summer record order only.
[1]: https://lolesports.com/article/10-thoughts-going-into-lcs-summer/bltcad887eb185f4e7f
**1. 100 Thieves: 25-11 (Summer, 14-4)**
When I interviewed 100 Thieves jungler Closer, Abbedagge had scrimmed with the team for approximately a day. Closer mentioned how the patch change had hit them hard in Spring and it was one of the reasons behind their roster moves for Summer. In addition to his excitement to be reunited with Abbedagge professionally, he also spoke very highly of Reapered, despite only having worked with him for a few days.
"Working with Reapered I can definitely feel that he knows how to be a champion," Closer said. "He's a championship coach and what he brings to the team is really important. I can already feel that. We've scrimmed a really small amount but he knows how to make a good team and now we have a really good mid laner as well."
Despite coming off of their worst Summer week to date — Huhi said on the analyst desk that they also had a shaky week of scrims going into it — 100 Thieves still look like the strongest team in the LCS due to their flexibility. This is not a team that should be stymied by a looming meta change, not only due to the addition of Abbedagge, but the direction that Reapered is providing for the team. Closer's pre-season praise of the coach has been echoed by every member of 100 Thieves this split, and it's clear that there has been a more serious attitude shift in a team that was already hungry for the title.
**2. Evil Geniuses: 22-14 (Summer, 12-6)**
When I requested Danny as my Evil Geniuses interview for 10 Thoughts, it was a no-brainer. Deftly's departure from the team went virtually unnoticed in the LCS community as did Danny's arrival. The small amount of chatter that accompanied the announcement was surprise that he had been bumped up from amateur to LCS, skipping the Academy step.
Others who had watched more of him in Proving Grounds described him as someone with remarkable teamfighting who may need time adjusting to the difference in laning against stronger 2v2s.
I had watched him on EG Prodigies and knew him as "that kid who popped off on Samira." Knowing of his aggressive teamfighting style I asked him how he was meshing with the LCS lineup.
"We've been having a lot of success on a lot of hard engage team comps," Danny said before the Summer began. "I think we have a lot of variety as a team. I want to not be the one person on my team that could be the reason why we're not doing well. I want to be one of the best in my team even though I'm a rookie.”
Danny has doggedly met every challenge while remaining unapologetically himself and exceeding everyone's expectations. He appears to be the perfect culture fit for a team that already wasn't afraid to try for high-risk, high-reward plays and both he and his teammates have said that he's growing to be a strong voice in comms — another pleasant surprise due to his outwardly soft-spoken demeanor and rookie status. He's a name in both Rookie of the Year conversations and even some MVP discussions. Alongside the rise of 100 Thieves, Danny and Evil Geniuses are the story of LCS Summer.
**3. TSM: 24-12 (Summer, 12-6)**
Due to a previous conflict, TSM was the one team that I couldn't meet up with before the Summer season (I was on the Analyst Desk for the Collegiate Finals the day that TSM had their asset day). This means that you're just going to have my own ramblings on them, for which I apologize profusely.
My pre-Summer-split thoughts on TSM were that they were an odd hybrid of a SwordArt team (Flash Wolves, Suning) and traditional, stodgy, think-scale-reset-repeat TSM.
Against my better judgment (the part of me that wants the bloodiest, most aggressive games possible even if the calls aren't always the best) I really enjoy this TSM lineup. I also don't mind that they're experimenting with things outside of their comfort zone like the Lucian at the start of the split and more recently, Lee Sin mid for PowerOfEvil. With how well Spica has been playing overall, they can lean on him to be a stable influence even when they're running a composition that they're not as comfortable with. There are a lot of games this Summer and TSM have a cushion of wins that they've been good about not throwing away.
That being said, I can't help but think of TSM as a team at a crossroads. Their draft experimentation has been full of poor execution and a rigid framework of what they planned versus what they're able to have in a live draft that sometimes throws them off-kilter. There's no better time for TSM to test out a few things, but their natural style of scaling for 5v5 front-to-back fights is also something that doesn't work well with poor execution, because too much is often ceded in the early game. More than any other team, I'm curious to see what TSM bring to the table in these next three weeks leading into playoffs.
**4. Team Liquid: 22-14 (Summer, 10-8)**
Santorin was my featured interview going into Summer. Given everything that has happened, it feels particularly bad since Santorin's absence from the team is a health issue that he has little control over. I wish him nothing but the best and a swift recovery so he can return to his professional career as soon as possible.
"I was so dizzy I could barely stand up," Santorin said of the same chronic headaches that kept him out of Spring Finals."While we were playing the semifinals I couldn't watch. I was just laying in bed. It was rough. I hate losing out on games and I felt really bad for my team that, even Armao, I felt bad for him too. He didn't have time to gel with the team before playing. It was a rough situation overall for everyone."
This sentiment towards Armao was echoed in Santorin's twitlonger where he explained that he was still suffering from headaches and wanted to make sure that Armao had as much practice time with the team. You can tell that the finals loss weighs on him, despite the fact that he didn't play in it himself.
As for where Team Liquid are at currently, the LCS is no longer a two-horse (pun intended, I guess) race between Cloud9 and Team Liquid. The rise of 100 Thieves with Abbedagge and Evil Geniuses with Danny have eclipsed TL both in narrative and gameplay. Now that Alphari is back, hopefully TL will have a more stable framework so the team can continue to gel with Armao and shore up their early game problems with converting individual leads to team advantages.
**5. Cloud9: 22-14 (Summer, 9-9)**
Like TSM, I didn't have a chance to catch up with C9 in the days leading up to the split due to scheduling and their quarantine period, but I did have a chance to talk to them prior to MSI. One thing that they reiterated was that, regardless of placement, the ability to scrim against stronger teams outside of North America would give them an advantage upon returning to the LCS.
That didn't happen for a few reasons, the main one likely being that they were integrating an entirely different player in K1ng onto the lineup, which changed the team dynamic. A cursory look around the four major regions reveals that all MSI teams struggled upon returning or have continued to not look as strong in their home regions. DAMWON KIA can be listed as a soft exception, but even they made sure to give AD carry Ghost a requested break and didn't look as dominant in the first four weeks of LCK Summer with losses to KT Rolster, Brion Blade, and Nongshim RedForce. C9 similarly have not looked as dominant in Summer as they did in Spring, even when taking into consideration the LCS lighting gaffe that aggravated Perkz's post-op eyes.
C9, like Team Liquid and TSM, have time and a win cushion to figure it out. They also have the worst record of the top five teams right now at 9-9 on the Summer and have dropped down the standings from first in Spring to currently tied for third overall. As an outsider, I actually see C9 as having similar issues to TL in that their mid/jungle synergy and setup is what they need to work on the most. At times, the entire team has seemed completely out-of-sync with each other. In Spring, C9 played around Perkz enabling Blaber and transferring that strong early pressure around the map. Given how good Fudge has looked this split, if C9 can get it together, they have the potential to be stronger than they were in Spring.
**6. Immortals: 15-21 (Summer, 8-10)**
Revenge was one of the more interesting of my pre-Summer interviews because he was transparent in his frustration with himself. He knew that he had good individual moments, but hadn't established himself as a top-tier top laner like he wanted. I appreciated the honesty because everyone says that they want to be the best, but few actually talk about what that means and the self-doubt that can occur.
"I want to be someone that other top laners in the league are going to have trouble facing," Revenge said. "My goal coming into the split in Spring was just that I wanted to compete with everyone because at a certain point when you keep hearing, 'Oh, is he LCS ready?' you're kind of like, 'Oh, can I even compete? Who knows?' You start to doubt yourself a bit. Of course I can compete with everyone. Now I need to show that I can be at the top."
In a way, this has become an interesting microcosm for Immortals themselves. They started the Summer off 3-0 in Week 1 with more consistent team play and stronger coordination around vision — aided by a meta that suited Xerxe perfectly. The next week they went 0-3. Immortals stabilized somewhat but in the midst of EG's rise, are still firmly in the middle of the pack. I continue to appreciate Immortals' stubbornness in sticking to more difficult or execution-heavy compositions, and can only hope it's paying off internally.
**7. Dignitas: 18-18 (Summer, 7-11)**
After talking to aphromoo in the offseason, I had such high hopes for Dignitas.
This was a team in Spring that, despite wins with a deficit due to single teamfights, was interesting and fun to watch. FakeGod, Soligo, and Neo had reversed some of the community sentiment from their initial rushed debuts on 100 Thieves and OpTic respectively, and Dignitas seemed to have the perfect setup with veterans aphromoo and Dardoch leading a lineup of three young and talented players.
"Coming into the new split, we should be a lot more gelled where people understand how everyone wants to play," aphromoo said. "And for the three young guys they're able to talk about and take control over what they want to do."
Summer started similarly in playstyle for Dignitas and then Soligo was bumped down to Academy while Yusui moved up. Then Dignitas became yet another name in a lengthy list of previous LCS teams for Dardoch. Dardoch had been such a focal point of Dignitas' gameplan that suddenly the team found themselves looking for a new identity with Akaadian and Yusui as their new jungle/mid duo. Dignitas still seem to be looking for that elusive playstyle, but it's been interesting to see the shift with Akaadian, another carry-style jungler who has played more for his lanes than they have played for him.
**8. Golden Guardians: 10-26 (Summer, 7-11)**
Iconic gave me a window into Golden Guardians' offseason that I found interesting. They actually held tryouts.
"They tried out people from the Academy team for every position and then for certain positions they also tried out people outside of the team," Iconic said. "It was fun."
Emerging from tryouts as their new top laner was Solo, who brought stability to the early laning phase, and Chime from the Academy lineup. Golden Guardians were visibly a better team — especially with Iconic improving and Ablazeolive able to pop off on certain champions — but still had difficulty closing out games and adapting in situations that they previously hadn't seen.
The addition of Licorice is the latest in Golden Guardians' moves and after the first week it seems to be a good fit. Licorice brings a different stable of champions and seems down to go along with some of the odder things that Golden Guardians like to throw at their opponents to catch them off guard. Most importantly, Golden Guardians' turret dives, which were already looking better, continue to improve.
**9. FlyQuest: 12-24 (Summer, 6-12)**
Hilariously enough, my interview for FlyQuest was then-top-laner Licorice. He talked about his continuing struggle to be a main veteran voice on the team, and hoping that they would be able to build on what few inroads they did make in Spring. Overall, he was optimistic and enthusiastic.
The FlyQuest of Summer is now a completely different unit of five in Kumo, Nxi, Triple, Tomo, and Diamond (who was on the initial LCS Spring lineup but swapped to the Academy roster when Dreams was promoted to LCS). This team's initial 3-0 success in the LCS isn't an indictment so much of the LCS quality — although you can argue that as well — but rosterbuilding and the way organizations look at teams. You can run down a lineup on paper and bring talented players together from all over, but if they don't work well together on the Rift, then it's all moot. The former FlyQuest Academy lineup may be worse on paper, but they all see the game the same way, and that alone can take a team pretty far.
Licorice is now on Golden Guardians, slotting onto a roster that seemed to work well with him almost instantly. While on FlyQuest Licorice bore the brunt of criticism aimed at the team, he's now seen as a welcome addition to a GG lineup fully willing to experiment with things like Trundle top or Kalista mid. In closing, I'll leave a small piece of advice that Licorice had for himself as a pro player that I think we could all take into consideration.
"In the past I've focused a lot more on what people think or what analysts think of my play and I followed it really closely and tried to figure out how to make it better. Where I'm at now, I'm trying not to care as much."
**10. CLG: 10-26 (Summer, 5-13)**
CLG have had a rough past few days and while I don't have an attachment to the organization, I do feel badly for the players themselves, who obviously are frustrated and want to win.
At the start of the Summer split, Broxah was optimistic about CLG's trajectory. Given his time on Team Liquid last year, when their performance dramatically improved with time to play together regularly, he was hoping for a similar situation with CLG. Despite struggling in Spring due to roster shifts and visa issues, they would come together in Summer.
"We're not going to catch up to a team like C9 right away," Broxah told me before Summer began. But I think being given more time, we will be able to catch up. That's what happened on Team Liquid."
"Even before I arrived the team was really solid Level 1," Broxah said. "They had some really solid early games and it just came down to closing out the game. In the mid and late game where we had to coordinate as a team and everything had to come together, usually we'd fall apart."
In an ideal world, they would have been able to build on this and move forward. Instead, CLG has struggled mightily to find a playstyle that suits them beyond a few off-meta picks. Going into this week, Damonte will join the team, replacing Pobelter in the mid lane. He has a very different style of play than Pobelter that's much more focused on transferring anything he has (or giving up his own mid priority) to roam around the map. Maybe it will be the breath of fresh air that CLG needs, similar to the Golden Guardians' situation.
