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Week 1 rankingings discussion

Admiral Howe·6/5/2017, 2:48:57 AM·5 votes·546 views

So like my post before, i love being that one guy who annoys everyone with ranking in the NA LCS, after week 1, some of my rankings were true, other were horribly wrong with some of you guys hitting the nail on the head 100% so here we go with my Week 1 rankings for teams, and players ordering in a top 5.

Top lane:

  1. Ssumday: i had this guy at 3-4 if i remember correctly and jesus christ his Lucian alone got him at number 1, i thought adding Big over Xpecial would hurt the experience in their bot lane along with Keane and Chaser being average at best but Ssumday reminded us all why he was in hot contention with Smeb for number 1 top laner in the LCK, im verry happy to see him pop off after the disappointing spring split for DIG

  2. Flame: again, i had him lowest at 5, siting IMT had a comp allowing him to be Flame but didnt place much trust in Pobelter or Cody Sun for Flame to really shine but beating out Hauntzer and Zig back to back really shows that the old god himself is making a comeback

  3. Darshan: My number 1 pick falls to 3 but thats because Flame and Ssumday were straight up insane. He may not be Zionspartan anymore but he is proving that CLG doesnt need Zion, because they have the playmaking tank player in Darshan, im happy to see both IMT and CLG both flourished with the trade

  4. Hauntzer: He showed a gigantic weakness as i predicted on squishies/carries but that isnt taking from him when he manages to play a tank like CLG has Darshan doing, i feel like if TSM can utilize this, he can move up

  5. Zig: Zig is still showing he can be in the upper echelon of top laners but like i said before, sometimes Inori and Shady hurt P1 more than they help so he is struggling to be that carry they need

Jungle:

  1. Xmithie: The shot caller that makes IMT look like a dominant number 1 (more on that later), he helped a rookie and 2 Koreans who cited communication problems defeat the top team from NA last split in a fashion that was similar to CLG in 2016 and im excited to see what he can do now that the meta is suiting him so well again so we can actually see Xmithie carry.

  2. Dardoch: Who the hell couldve predicted that Dardoch could be a team player while providing that aggression that CLG felt they were missing? He was a beast akin to Bengi on SKT, you dont notice his work until you step back and realize he did a lot in CLG's victories.

  3. Akaadian: some screw ups but im letting that slide, the first blood king of NA is back and looking so so good again

  4. Chaser: I never looked at Chaser and thought, man this guy is good or this guy is bad, he was just there in the spring split but he has been playing with a style that lets everyone work off of him and win, kind of in the shadows, applying information and vision to minimize mistakes

  5. Svenskeren: still making the dumb invades, still looking like he's lacking confidence but still mechanically fantastic but too much mistakes and missed opportunities while sometimes getting outplayed in the micro aspect to have any victories over better junglers

Mid Lane:

  1. Huhi: This guy was a force for CLG in the spring and is still going strong while teams run their "Camp and tilt Huhi" strat and that is scary

  2. Pobelter: Even if Bjerg played Galio mid twice, he showed the P.O.B. is back and ready to compete with the best of them

  3. Bjergsen: Still the best but his Galio was leaving something to be missed and kinda cost TSM the game against IMT with those picks so he falls here

  4. Jensen: Im so disappointed to see C9 fall 0-2 on the week but he still showed why they compare him to Bjerg, both my 1 and 2 picks falling this week

  5. Keane: surprisingly yeah Keane over Ryu, he didnt screw up, he did his job and didnt chimp out and did more for his team than Ryu if you consider the matchups

Bot Lane Duos:

  1. Cody Sun and Olleh: These guys just suprised the hell out of me hanging with Arrow and Shady as well as Double Lift and Biofrost, im so high on these guys right now and IMT looks so good

  2. Stixxay and Aphromoo: Batman and Robin are back, Slim and Dr. Dre, im a CLG fanboy and seeing then start to return to their winning ways is great

  3. DoubleLift and Biofrost: They werent going to fall far and this 3 spot is circumstance, theyre still the best in my opinion but this week they got outshined.

  4. L OD and Big: didnt need to be spectacular, just played that early day style of Korean bot lanes, shut up, dont die and kill towers. I like it so far

  5. Arrow and Shady: Not much to say, other better bot lanes didnt show up this week and i expect them to fall harder if they keep this kind of play up

Team Rankings:

1st. IMT: So damn dominant which surprised me, Flame is back on point, Cody Sun and Olleh have continued to improve from their end of Spring run, Pobelter is playing like himself again and a massive shot calling boost with Xmithie, not to mention the coaching change, i still think the 2nd game between IMT and TSM will burn the house down like it did week 1, im proud of these guys' improvement

2nd. CLG: Still looked shaky but tore down C9 and managed to not let their mistakes hold them down and smashed by sticking to the plan good on them.

3rd. TSM: DoubleLift and Svenskeren look shaky, call it rusty for now, and Biofrost changing to be a playmaker might give them more struggles later on. Not to mention hauntzer playing too aggro, it might cost them

4th. DIG: Solid 4th or 5th team, i think they will be the stepping stone for bottom teams to prove they can hang against the top 3.

5th. EchoFox: Im scared of the start here, too wary after the fantastic spring start but for now, ill believe.

What do you guys think? Where do you place teams and players? Am i a noob who knows nothing? Am i right? am i wrong? Lemme know, i like seeing you guys chime in, its great.

6 Comments

hotarse6/5/2017, 3:34:32 AM3 votes

All I know is TL #10!

III BAKURYU III 6/5/2017, 3:47:52 AM2 votes

Ssumday - Dig // Honestly, I'm actually shocked how well the pick/ban was for DIG and how they played off Ssumday, before he would farm for 50 mins on a tank and would teamfight but having the best player on a tank with an OK Lod as the carry and Keane wasn't going so well for DIG in the Spring. My point is the Lucain pick up was great and I wouldn't be surprised if Ssumday does it again and/or picks another hyper carry ADC/Assassin top in future games.

Immortals// This is what happens when cooler heads prevail. I'm still not sold on the botlane and Pobleter honestly over achieved if I'm being brutally honest here. This team reminds me of CJ Blaze from 5 years ago( Flame was on that team) Xmithie having that team first mentality similar to Helios in his day, Pobelter being Ambition in which when Ambition did play MID he would just die randomly and constantly pre 6 and while Pobelter doesn't die 24/7 he does have a history of racking up the deaths 2.6 per game(isn't OMG but isn't great) and with Cody/Olleh as CPt. Jack and Lustboy who both do decent but aren't really noticed all that much on respective teams.

Chaser // He's really seemed to have stepped up his game after Spring that's for sure. He just seems quicker on his decisions and overall quicker on the draw.

CLG// " Slim and Dr. Dre " haha With C9 most likely going to put Ray in the corner for the rest of the split because of the 0-2( While it's not 100% his fault, Sneaky mid lane was dumb, Jensen dying at weird places) it does show they NEED Impact to be top tier, without Impact they would most likely be 7-8th. For CLG beating C9 2nd Spring while wounded was so good, already taking a game series off them will hopefully help them in the split.

The real story so far has to be Echo Fox at least for me, I placed them 10th with no more than 4 wins and well............yeah! Keith and Gate - Not sold, maybe they can be carried but if so how long ? If Froggen keeps playing like this and Echo Fox's botlane stays even I would say top 3 for EF

After week 1 - predicting and analyzing the whole split ..................... Tier A - EF - They play with energy now, GJ either to the players or to EFC team for helping this team.

CLG - I predicted them to make it to the NA Finals and I could be right if the team keeps it up.

DIG - 50% of the game is pick ban and I underestimated DIG for it( mainly Saint, in which once I heard he was going to be on DIG's coaching staff I thought " Oh god another Team Liquid"

Tier B - TSM - Gotta think they will rebound from this 1-1 isn't end of the World but same roster as 17-1 tho

C9 - If they go 0-3 against P1 I just don't see them making it to NA Finals if that does happen or maybe the Playoffs !

IMT - I like the 2-0 but can they keep it up is all.

Tier C NV - The strategy is this for the team " Don't fight, split push, farm" We've seen that before from teams in the past Dignitas 2014 Summer/Playoffs, CLG from 2013-14 and now NV. They gotta learn how to teamfight or they could be 1 step from 10th instead.

P1 - Zig is playing good, but at times it's like " get outta there, stop protecting the tower and RUN" and he gets 1v4 tower dove and loses tower anyways. With Inori P1 are like 25-29 and around 40 mins per game ( 39.6) in losing efforts, gotta get better as a team. 0 team focus fighting, and are really bad in lane from players that you just don't expect it from.

Tier D FQ - Team just relies on Hai's shotcalling..... that's it. Moon who was a product of Hai's shotcalling last split will show us why he's just not that good in my opinion if FQ continue to look this bad with just relying on Hai.

Tier F------------------- TL - Korean training huh GG , Lourlo is as useless as ever, Reignover and Piglet look dry as f*ck, but overall the team has 0 focus on anything again. 10th in EVERY objective last year and it looks like it's going to continue here. Gave up like 5 dragons, 2-3 elder and 1-2 barons while getting like 1 or 0 themselves, while having like 2 towers - 5 in total most likely in the 0-2 loss. RIP TL fans

You seem to know your League dude ;] but you're still a noob jk jk Good post/board!

Anastaecia6/5/2017, 1:24:24 PM2 votes

I know it's early, but that jg trade between CLG and IMT may be great for both teams.

Sagan Forever6/5/2017, 2:03:52 PM2 votes

My main fear with EF is that froggen does around 42% of his teams damage making it so that froggen cannot ever have a bad day.

Pippen The Short6/5/2017, 11:02:12 PM2 votes

Pretty Solid, I'll rejoin the discussion on ranking the players in a few weeks, I want to see more than 2 games.

The only one I really disagree with is Zig, dude got blanked in game 3 against IMT, and he played less than stellar in game 1 against NV, which they need way more from him than he provided.

But i'll bite on the teams performance overall:

Yeah, Liquid is just trash right now. Moving Piglet back to adc did not pay off, with so many quality ADC's available to sign like Freeze, or someone else, it seemed odd that they stuck with struggling or unproven talent in the mid role.

Phoenix 1 looks lost. Their pick sessions made it seem like they forgot that League evolved by 3 patches since the end of the last split regular season play. Losing to Immortals in a well fought series is forgivable, though game 3 looked like them trying to implement game 2 strategy. But losing NV in a dumpster fire fashion is not. Re-instating Inori over Meteos may have proven to be a bad decision, and as much as I hate Meteos, P1 may need to return him to the starting roster. Inori didn't play terribly, but I would wager that Meteos's aggressive shot calling, ganks, and play style over all brought more to the team than Inori's consistency.

Flyquest played worse than I expected, and that's saying something. While on paper the Wildturtle pick up looked good, the issue I saw was Lemonnation's relatively aggro and borderline careless, play style, combined with Wildturtle's super aggressive play style could prove to be disastrous. While you saw some bright spots in the early Game 1 vs Echo Fox, overall in that series they barely outperformed Keith/Gate, team fighting was not great, and all in all WT was not nearly as impactful as he was supposed to be. You got swept by EF, a team that only made structural and logistical changes, and lost to another bottom half team.

Cloud 9 had the toughest week 1 of anyone, which is the only reason I don't have them lower. But Sneaky and Smoothie looked awful, Contractz consistently got out jungled, and Ray was hands down the weakest link on the team probably competing for the worst top laner of the weekend. They lacked focus on objectives, their teamfights were subpar even for them. Maybe it was just a bad week for them, but their inability to handle their own lanes most of the time is troubling.

NV came out surprising, losing to Dignitas at first seemed like a standard weekend for NV, but coming back from a Game 2 loss and dominating Game 3 over P1 was definitely not standard. That was probably the biggest surprise for me. I do expect NV still finish lower than i've got them in week 1, but it's hard to put them lower right now.

Dignitas, another huge surprise, starting 2-0 is a big deal for them even if the competition wasn't the in the top tier for them. Ssumday looked like the number 1 top laner in the NA LCS, Keane and Chaser looked good, and while I think LOD still has a lot to prove, he synced well with Big. Which, bot lane being your weakest lane is a big deal, I expect them to clean it up. The decision to run away from Ssumday on tanks was a great decision and paid huge dividends for the team. I think Week 3 and 4 will really test the merit of the team.

TSM getting swept to the hottest team of Week 1 was rough for sure, and DL and BF looked a little rusty. But I trust that they'll right the ship in time there. The only major issue is Sven, and off-meta picks on Bjerg. The mid Galio didn't work, and doubling down on it defintely wasn't the right call, and Svenskeren played bottom 5. His rotations were bad, his contribution to vision was bad, his ganks were meh at best, and he felt absent in team fights. If TSM is going to go back to Worlds or win summer split they need to do something about him. Whether it's to put him on different picks and play style or find a different player, but they need to be seriously invested in solving the issue.

Echo Fox looked like the most fundamental team in the LCS right now. Sure, the competition wasn't super stellar, but they never trailed post 20-minutes in a game, they controlled every baron and dragon and won all 4 matches played. Akaadian played like the best jungler of the weekend, Froggen played assassins well instead of his usual control style mages, Keith and Gate played consistent, but not amazing and I think Looper overall played the worst but his aggression in teamfights worked well. Overall, they took care of business in a commanding fashion and the off-Rift changes could change the way teams operate. So the jury is still out on their experiment but it looks very good so far and EF is off to its best start ever.

CLG won a very competitive and close match against C9. The return of Aphromoo to being relevant and impactful was huge for them, Dardoch is finally on a team where he can still win even if he doesn't play like a demi-god, which should be a cause of concern for everyone else. CLG played at a high level consistently throughout the weekend and despite the level play I still don't think we've seen the best of them yet.

Immortals beat the Spring split champs; they swept them. Xmithie has never looked more at home, Flame played at the same level of his pay check, and Cody and Olleh ended looking like the best bot lane of the weekend, which the fact that is even debatable considering the performance Stix and Aphro put on, speaks for itself.