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8 thoughts going into Quarterfinals
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Sixteen up, eight down. Eight to go. This is the Worlds Quarterfinals, where every team remaining is telling themselves that they’re only a few good days away from hoisting the Summoner’s Cup. Hundreds of professional players across the world now turn their eyes to the final forty and wonder just how far away they really are. Here’s 8 thoughts going into Quarterfinals!
**1. Mourn in the USA**
For the second year in a row, the LCS will not be sending a single team beyond the Group Stage, which means we will see another offseason full of tricks and tips on *How To Fix the LCS*. I am sure it will be full of solutions that no NA organization has ever thought about. To their credit, FlyQuest and Team Liquid put up admirable showings despite being eliminated. Both teams finished with 3-3 records in groups they were widely not expected to advance from -- FLY especially was seen to be doomed in Group D. It’s not a good result, but we are definitively the 4th best region, so I’m not sure what we’re actually supposed to expect. Both FLY and TL posted marquee wins and showed that LCS teams *are* capable of playing at a high level even if it’s not particularly consistent. I especially appreciated how they demonstrated that, on an individual level, LCS players aren’t mechanically outmatched like they may have been in the past. Many of our problems seem to stem from more macro level concepts -- ranging from drafts that misread the meta to having poor understanding of wave management. Are these things fixable? Were they already being fixed? It’s one of those situations where I have to wonder if they’d been allowed to play 12 games in groups, would TL and FLY have continued to adapt and eventually been able to push to a #2 or even #1 placement in their groups (one can dream…)? It’s clear NA teams spend a lot of time playing catchup once they reach the international stage, but I believe they *are* capable of catching up. Unfortunately Worlds has a timer, and the timer being six games means that’s it. We’re done again. I hope we remember that cheering for a region is not the same thing as predicting them to win -- the LCS is not a favorite and may never be, but you didn’t become a fan of the LCS because they won internationally (literally impossible). I hope to see you back next year -- you being the fans and the tenacity we saw from TL and FLY in Week 2.
**2. As for TSM…**
Their performance was the single most embarrassing international result the LCS has ever produced, and to be the first #1 seed from a major region to not take even a single win makes it arguably the most embarrassing result from anyone at any time, period. I told my noob friend to Ashe Arrow the first person she saw once and she turned around and fired it at me instead and even *that* is less embarrassing. There aren’t any single problems you can even point at. No Doublelift forgetting to Flash. No dashing forward into Viktor. No Bjergsen and the wards. No lack of early jungle pressure. You don’t go 0-6 from just one or two mistakes. TSM struggled at basically every facet of the game. They now enter a long offseason with a lot of questions to answer. That said, I am never one to advocate for blowing everything up -- I am sure they know better than anyone else that what just transpired is unacceptable, and the silver lining going forward is that even in a world where they retain their entire roster, they’ll be able to play knowing that it can literally never get worse than the 0-6 performance. They can match it again, sure, but it can’t get worse, and sometimes confirming what rock bottom looks like and feels like can do a lot for your confidence. And while I know domestic titles don’t really mean as much to TSM and to players like Doublelift, I will say that winning Summer and failing spectacularly is still better than the previous two years where TSM didn’t win anything period. I hope they’re able to accept that the year still had some high points even if the final result was abysmal. The absolutely crushing defeat should let them take a good deep look at what went wrong, and in the best case scenario, make sweeping changes for the better.
**3. Welcome to the Jungle**
Here is the scenario: you are playing jungle and Lee Sin is on the other team. You are on red side, so you start blue for a nice leash, and then you head over to red. If you are a jungle main, then you already know that statistics show that 98% of Lee Sin players will invade your red buff at level 2 in this situation regardless of whether or not their solo laners have pressure. In fact, their mid laner could be literally AFK and that Lee Sin will still be there. You ping for help but your mid laner also appears to be AFK since they’re not responding. That feeling is exactly what every jungler feels when facing Suning’s jungler SofM, except it’s not just the red buff. It’s also your 3rd Raptor spawn and your 6th Gromp Spawn. It’s every camp. You could finish the game and head to the refrigerator for a cold beer to cool off and SofM will also be there to contest it -- you will receive nothing without first fighting. Suning is one of the most unique teams heading to the Quarterfinals, and I am extremely excited that SofM will continue to receive more stage time -- after Vietnam was unfortunately unable to attend Worlds at all, I hope his presence will serve as a bit of a consolation for Vietnamese faithful. The LPL was dominated all year long by JDG and TES, which means Suning’s 3rd place finish has them flying under the radar as we head into the bracket stage. Kanavi has been one of (if not *the&) best jungler in the LPL all year, so this will be a truly exciting test for SofM -- you figure if they can best Kanavi with their style, then they can beat anybody.
**4. LPL Autumn vs. LCK Autumn ft. LEC**
On the one hand, it’s disappointing that we’ll get at least two and potentially a total of four “team kills” in the sense of LPL and LCK teams eliminating each other. On the other hand, though, that means we are very likely to get an interregional matchup for the Finals, barring a big run from both the LEC representatives. I think it’s reasonable to expect similar results as the Summer Split, but it’s definitely not a lock -- while TES and JDG have proven to be world-class teams all year long, it’s never a guarantee that a patch won’t be your downfall (pan the camera to Cloud9). Sometimes it’s a single champion pick or a single item or style that you can master to suddenly spike into the best team in the world for the span of a couple weeks. And that would be enough to make you the World Champion -- in every single sport in the world, there are plenty of times where the *best* team doesn’t win. You just need to be the better team enough times to advance, and in a world where you could flip a coin five times and see it land head all five times, truly anything can happen. I’m excited to see how each side of the bracket develops, and I’m excited to see if Europe can make a splash.
**5. LCK’s moment**
In the past two Worlds, Korean teams have notoriously floundered (by their standards, anyway) by not making a single Finals (compounded by struggles at MSI as well). There seems to be a different air about them this year, and now with the bracket draw that has three of their teams on one side, the odds are heavily stacked in their favor to finally return to the Finals stage. However, you could probably argue a similar feel was here last year too. In fact, 5 out of 6 Korean teams have finished #1 in their group over the last two years at Worlds, which means dominance in the Group Stage is nothing new to them. If anything, this year’s Group Stage performance is actually worse than last year, so they’re once again riding a similar kind of wave that completely crashed onto them at this very moment last year. Then you look at the sole non-Korean team on their side of the bracket and realize it’s the exact same G2 roster that knocked out Damwon *and* T1 last year. The same “villain” returning, surely, doesn’t mean they’ll face the exact same ending, right? This Damwon team has finally made the leap to being a top tier team, but I wonder if you actually have more confidence in them than in T1 last year, and if you don’t, then what makes you think G2 *isn’t* the favorite to advance from the LCK autumn side of the bracket? It’s bound to be causing LCK fans to sweat nervously, and I don’t blame them. The flip side, though, is this is exactly the kind of setup you want if you are seeking redemption -- for Damwon especially -- a trip through the very team that eliminated them and the LCK’s hopes last year would be a dream scenario. This, of course, is looking a bit ahead -- GenG has historically been dominant in Bo5s, and perhaps they can exorcise Damwon’s demon in the Round of 8.
**6. Europe’s dark horses**
I personally have G2 making it all the way to the Finals, which as I explained above is because I think they should be considered the favorite until proven otherwise against LCK teams. This is a team that has a penchant for floundering around in Bo1s, which is something you saw both in the LEC Summer Split and in Group Stage this year. I’m not saying they’re intentionally throwing or anything like that (they’re clearly not) but it does feel a bit like the sitting upright meme where they are a little too lax until it actually matters. Even in a Bo5 you might see them play a “happy” game if you will, but this has been an extremely clutch team over the last two years, and while their performance isn’t as dominant as it was last year, I still think their ceiling is in a similar spot. This roster improves significantly as Worlds goes on, and I believe they are getting closer to remembering the exact bitterness in their mouths from the crushing defeat to FPX last year. Of course, this is all sentimental narratives from me, a narrative writer first and an analyst not even 2nd but like 4th or 5th. The fact of the matter is that they don’t actually look better, and in many ways Fnatic impressed me more in the Group Stage, though G2 still has eye-popping moments especially in team fights where it feels like they are simply more skilled than their opponents. G2 has a way of tricking you into believing they are the best team in the world whether it’s true or not. On the other side of the bracket, Fnatic’s road seems much more difficult, especially because they begin against the #1 seed from the LPL -- a TES team that is extremely capable at all facets of the game and won’t flop over to Fnatic’s shenanigans. TES plays a pretty stable style in that Karsa is the kind of jungler to enable his laners and provide support, and it should be an interesting stylistic contrast to Selfmade’s carry-oriented lean for Fnatic. There are no easy outs left for the LEC teams -- being runner-up at Worlds two years in a row means anything short of that will be a disappointment.
**7. The Bridesmaids**
JDG and DRX finished runner-up in the LPL and LCK Summer Splits respectively and now stare down the prospect of a rematch against the very team that knocked them out (in DRX’s case, literally right now). This is like when you finally finish a tough year of school where some asshole has been bullying you only to start school the next year and find them in the same classes as you. Or maybe their locker is next to yours. They look at you, and you look at them, and either this is the beginning of the teenage romcom and you get dunked into the toilet again, or it’s the latter part of the movie and you are finally making your big stand. DRX, unfortunately, feels like they may still be in the beginning of the movie. They didn’t impress me that much in the Group Stage, especially when it came to macro. It felt like they just got pulled all over the map by TES, and when you consider they were 3-0ed by DWG in the LCK Finals in similar fashion, it’s difficult for me to envision a route to victory for them. They have some extremely talented laners, but just winning lane isn’t going to be enough against DWG. As for JDG -- they have to first defeat Suning before they’re even allowed to think about a rematch, but I wonder if the looming threat of it will distract them too much. They were extremely evenly matched with TES throughout the LPL this year, and a third Best-of-5 would let them settle their 1-1 scoreline on such series this year. I’m a big fan of teams with chips on their shoulders, and while regional rematches may be less interesting than seeing different regions clash, I think it’s a great chance for the players to find a little bit of redemption.
**8. The Brides**
Top is good. That’s it. Send tweet. In fact the only thing bad about them is that they decided to name themselves Top Esports but then make their tricode TES and not TOP -- that is, as the kids say, a hard int. This team was buoyed greatly by the dominant play of JackeyLove, who, alongside Ruler, is one of two remaining players with a World Championship to their name. JackeyLove has also made it to the Semifinals in literally every international event he has attended and is the overwhelming favorite to do so once again. TES looked dominant in the Group Stage outside of the one slip-up against FLY (which seemed to stem from a somewhat experimental draft), and was especially dominant when the game state was close. It felt like 2k to 3k leads against them may as well have been even. I am curious to see if Knight will step up a little in the Quarterfinals -- he’s been good so far, but I don’t think he has quite lived up to the pre-tournament projection of being the #1 overall player. The mid Nocturne pick was definitely exciting, though, so I hope we get to see a bit more flexing from him -- it felt like Groups was the stage for him to shake off his nerves, and perhaps we’ll see him ramp up now that the Bo5s are beginning. As for the other pre-tournament favorite, Damwon looked absolutely dominant in their matches until finally falling to JDG in their final game. If not for that loss, you’d have to immediately peg them as the big favorite going into the knockout rounds. The bracket has panned out in such a way that a final between TES and DWG is still easily achievable -- Finals where the pre-tournament #1 and #2 teams both make it are pretty rare (last year was the one time you could argue it happened), and in a Worlds devoid of upsets so far, we may just get it.
