This week we revealed more information about our new shooter [VALORANT][1], and Doublelift sat out because of “sickness.” What if he’s simply making way to become a professional first-person marksman? Makes you think. The most important news however is that Cloud9’s mid turret, with its first death, now has a defined KDA. Here’s 10 more thoughts going into Week 7!
[1]: https://playvalorant.com/en-us/
**Cloud9 (12-0) — This paragraph, again, says C9 is good**
Reddit user “erikplayer” looked up the KDA stat so I didn’t have to, and it turns out Cloud9’s tier one mid turret is 0/1/0 on the season, which means nobody has botched a mid lane dive against C9. Considering it’s only died once, it makes sense that there hasn’t been much pressure placed on that point of the map, period. You can’t dive Nisqy if he’s never in lane. Cloud9’s tear through the LCS continued with two more dominant victories, though you could argue this was C9’s toughest weekend. Here’s what happened: first off, FlyQuest managed to drag them past the 35 minute mark, and then Dignitas took their mid turret for the first time this split. For that sentence to quantify “toughest weekend” means C9’s split has been insanely dominant. We are fast pushing towards a game 18 where four-time reigning champ Team Liquid will have the final opportunity to take a game from C9. I could pretty much just copy paste a template for Cloud9 every week that says, “They still haven’t lost. They are very good. Here is a stat proving it.” And so… to reiterate… they still haven’t lost. They are very good. TL’s Tactical had a perfect debut -- not dying a single time -- and his KDA (14) is still less than half of Zven’s (34.3) and lower than Vulcan’s (16.7).
**FlyQuest (8-4) — What does 2nd mean?**
I finished 2nd in my 5th grade spelling bee because I spelled “spirited” wrong (I panicked and let weird grammar rules trick me into putting in two Ts), which is something I will likely remember for the rest of my life. This is to say getting second is not a bad thing and is often memorable, even. This is also to say it is memorable because I didn’t win and not specifically because it was second. Which is all a roundabout way of saying second is good for FlyQuest, but it ultimately will not matter in the Spring Split. They sit, after another crushing defeat against C9, in sole possession of 2nd in the LCS (which means they have a very strong claim to being the outright 2nd best team in the LCS), but are still clearly closer in skill to the 9th place team (and honestly maybe even the 10th place team) than the 1st place team. So I ask, then, is this enough for them? Surely the answer must be no if you are an aspiring pro team, especially in the Spring Split where only the winner will advance to MSI. And then I ask, what can you even do to catch C9 at this point? It doesn’t feel like a roster swap is the right move, but it also feels like they’re kinda capped. Short of some massive meta shift, I think it must be frustrating to be second and still this far away from Cloud9.
**Immortals (6-6) — The worst good team? The best worst team?**
I was ready to declare IMT the worst team in the league if they lost to CLG, and halfway through that match, it definitely felt like that would happen. IMT, though, managed to pull a win out of the magician’s hat again thanks to some strong split pressure from sOAZ and the rest of the team doing what they could to avoid and delay a stronger CLG team fight. That said, I’m still not entirely convinced that IMT aren’t the worst team in the league, and I feel like in a Best-of-5 I’d take CLG over IMT right now (part of this is definitely me buying too much into the Notorious P.O.B. memes). Snapping the four-game losing streak is really good for their actual record, but it feels like other teams have generally gelled enough to not let split-push shenanigans or weird base races (IMT even tried a weird TP play against CLG to try to win earlier) affect them as much as earlier in the split. I expect this second half of the round robin will see IMT continue to be punished early such that they won’t even have the opportunity to flex their creative end game plays.
**Team Liquid (6-6) — Tactical is the MVP frontrunner**
Last year a lot of people floated (incorrectly) the idea that the Golden State Warriors, historically dominant, were better without Kevin Durant (Top 3 player in the NBA). We are still a little removed from that conversation with Tactical, who stepped in for Doublelift due to illness, but if he performs again (he’s been announced as the starter going into this weekend), then that drum is going to beat a lot louder and a lot more frequently. That said, Team Liquid is, in fact, not better without the greatest player in LCS history. He’s talked about his [low motivation][1] and how he’s going to change, but if you’ve been in bad relationships, then you’ve heard this one before from exes (or you said it yourself). What sometimes happens is that you don’t miss that person -- what you really miss is being in love with that person. But that doesn’t come back so easily. That’s the fear with Doublelift here -- he’s been around for a long time. But if we step beyond those things, which are harder to speak on, then I would like to speak to aspirations for this roster -- and no disrespect to Tactical, who was great in his debut, but would you honestly prefer him over Doublelift if you are trying to win Worlds? Right now he deserves to be benched, but I don’t question Doublelift’s motivation to win Worlds one bit. We saw Kevin Durant come back briefly against the Raptors in the NBA Finals, and he immediately dropped like ten points in the span of a couple minutes. People have a lot of recency bias by nature. I say all of this, and yet I can’t help but wonder if I am making the wrong sports analogy. How many pundits made the same claim about, say, Drew Bledsoe. And if you’re too bought into the Bledsoes of the world, do you end up missing out on the Brady?
[1]: https://twitter.com/TLDoublelift
**TSM (6-6) — tSm, TsM**
The TSM rollercoaster continues as they have gone six consecutive weeks finishing 2-0 or 0-2, which makes them the preeminent coin flip team in the LCS. One coin dictates two outcomes, though, which makes for some incredible efficiency. TSM has played a lot of weird shit this split, including most recently Maokai mid and Ezreal/Senna in bot lane. I tried Maokai mid twice in Solo Queue and went 0-7 and 0-9, so I would like to apologize to my teammates for those losses but at the same time, direct the blame at TSM. I actually thought both of these comps were interesting and I was pretty excited to see them try -- especially the Maokai comp -- so it’s disappointing that they fumbled both executions so badly. Giving up a game to CLG is embarrassing (this is putting it nicely), and then getting clobbered by a Doublelift-less TL is also not a good look. I am curious if they are playing too many different comps and styles when it seems like they have a lot of other issues to work on -- maybe the variety of comps is making it difficult to learn. Or, the other way of looking at this, is maybe these comps are an attempt to mask those difficulties. Their best strat this split has been to lean on Bjergsen (who has had a lot of mid and late game resources diverted away from him this split), so it might also just be that they are trying other things while knowing they can fall back on him if they need to.
**100 Thieves (5-7) — Ryoma making his mark**
Did 100 Thieves actually load onto the rift to play against TL? It’s hard to say -- I’ve already requested that the league launch an official investigation into the matter. 100 also did have what was maybe their best game of the split against EG, though, so I think we’ve managed to establish that they at least belong in the thick of the LCS soup. Ryoma had a great game and perhaps that can now serve as his mental save point for when shit starts to hit the fan -- he can look back this and realize he does in fact have it in him to perform well. Even more importantly, though, is that they managed to generate 24 kills in the game, which is something I hope they are able to keep up (part of this is also tied to EG’s willingness to take bad fights or good fights or literally any fight). It’s especially good that it wasn’t just a game that Ssumday hard-carried. It’s still a long way to the top for 100, but if this game can serve as a blueprint for them, then maybe the whole “process” thing is real.
**Dignitas (5-7) — Bird’s not the word**
Here are some picks we saw from Dignitas this week: Anivia, Ziggs, top Lucian with Ignite, and Jinx. I am wondering if DIG mistook the LCS this weekend for being Clash with the boys. Before the loss on Anivia, Froggen was 3-7 in the last 10 (so 3-8 in the last 11 now) on the champion, which has long been his pocket pick. I also have to assume that, since Anivia has never been a meta pick in that span, that it has only been picked when Froggen and his team felt like it was a good matchup or a good time to do so. Which makes the record actually worse than it looks. Combine that with the weird Jinx and Lucian picks, and I am just absolutely baffled by the DIG game plan on Monday against C9. There are risks you can -- and should -- take against a dominant C9. DIG’s gameplan felt less like a risk and more like throwing the towel in to just have fun instead. It felt like an extremely disrespectful draft by a team that’s not really in a position to be disrespectful. At 5-7 now, they are very much in danger of missing the playoffs (as is the rest of the soup), and are 2-7 in the last nine, which ties them with CLG for having the worst record in that span. I was worried that this team would struggle to adapt as the season went on, and seeing them fall back onto ineffective comfort only further reinforces my suspicions. Anivia’s been egged for a long time now, and I just don’t see it coming back to life in a world where League of Legends requires a mid laner that can be active across the map.
**Evil Geniuses (5-7) — Fine line between mad and genius**
EG is the professional equivalent of a player that always tells their team to Solo Queue Level 1 invade, and it is done without any real thinking as to whether the enemy Level 1 is better or not or really any thinking period. Sometimes it works and you pop off and look great, and sometimes they are waiting for you and blast you before you can even respond. It just looks like they don’t think through their plays sometimes. Being inconsistent is a nice way of saying you are bad, and EG is very definitively inconsistent. This does, however, make them one of the more exciting teams to watch (Svenskeren can go from 1-8 on Lee Sin one game to 4-0-7 the next, for example), and with one game left against C9, they might be the team that randomly has the best chance. You can be sure they aren’t afraid of C9 or anything at all -- usually. A lot of swirling reports and quotes from their players make it pretty clear this team isn’t on the same page when it comes to how they want to play the game, and that’s been reflected very clearly in their results.
**Golden Guardians (5-7) — The Closer**
Here is my hot take: Closer is the second best jungler in the LCS right now (behind Blaber). He does so much for this team, especially in the early game, and I think he's the main reason they’re not CLG-level when you look at the standings. Honestly I don’t even think it’s a hot take -- one of the great things about Closer is that he’s not just hogging all of the resources (by playing a hyper carry jungler, for example). Instead, he’s managed to make all of his laners look good by facilitating them and putting them in positions to succeed. That’s extremely rare to see from new junglers in the LCS and is a good reminder that he was an MVP in Turkey before coming over to NA. He’s pretty much exactly what teams want out of a jungler at this level of play, and while I don’t think the team as a whole is of a particularly high caliber, I do feel like he should be the piece this team builds around going forward. That’s something GG hasn’t ever had in their entire existence, and if you are a fan, then I think you should be extremely excited for the future even if the present is, well, soupy. I am also curious to see how much Keith can continue to improve -- with FBI look much improved this split compared to the last, if the two of them can continue upwards, then maybe this team will be a dark horse candidate going into the summer.
**Counter Logic Gaming (2-10) — 200 IQ roster swap**
Pobelter’s return has reinforced a key narrative from fans and pundits going into this season, which is that it was a travesty he didn’t get a starting spot in the league when you looked who actually did. You have to remember that, while he was still involved in the professional scene with TL, he wasn’t actually playing in a competitive environment, so for him to step in and immediately make CLG look better is a good reminder that Pobelter has always been a terrific mid laner in the LCS at least. CLG also officially announced that they were parting ways with Crown, which perhaps ends his brief and mostly unremarkable tenure in NA. I hope he was able to find what he was looking for when he came here. It truly is a mystery as to why this CLG collapsed so badly with him joining, but sometimes that’s just the way it is. Pobelter has invigorated this lineup, and while CLG still doesn’t look particularly good, at least they are able to compete now. The loss against IMT was a pretty embarrassing showcase of indecision, and I think it’s pretty clear that even with Pobelter, this team isn’t good -- they’re just not awful anymore. These last six games are going to serve as a bit of an audition for this roster -- is there hope, and if not, then what else needs to change?
