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Teams shuffle rosters for 2015 Summer

Riot·5/19/2015, 1:39:58 AM·0 votes·74,245 views
Each Split, every team hopes that they can win the Championship. But only one will reach that goal. Sometimes, progress towards that goal is enough for an organization, but sometimes, failure has consequences. Many teams opted to make dramatic changes to gear up for a Summer push. Check out all the roster shuffles of the offseason and see who the favorites are heading into the 2015 Summer Split.

EU LCS

Copenhagen Wolves, H2K, Giants Gaming, and Unicorns of Love all made no changes. Copenhagen Wolves showed such improvement with their slightly changed roster and new coach Karl "Dentist" Krey that they probably thought changes would only break up synergy. Unicorns of Love and H2K, as new teams in the League, greatly exceeded expectations with 2nd and 3rd Place finishes respectively. Giants Gaming still has some work to do as far as improving, but they've decided this roster gives them the best chance. Origen is one of the new teams competing in the EU LCS. They haven't made any roster changes, but we'd like to introduce you to this new team: Origen
  • Top: SoaZ
  • Jungle: Amazing
  • Mid: xPeke
  • ADC: Niels
  • Support: Mithy
Elements
  • Top: Wickd → Jwaow
  • Jungle: Shook → Dexter
  • Mid: Froggen
  • ADC: Rekkles → Tabzz
  • Support: Krepo → promisQ
Elements has undergone the most heavy renovation of any team in the LCS. After their disappointing 7th Place finish, they replaced all members except for their star mid laner Henrik "Froggen" Hansen. Their new lineup has some of the more reliable veterans in the EU scene such as Erik "Tabzz" van Helvert and Marcel "Dexter" Feldkamp, along with relative newcomers Jesper "Jwaow" Strandgren and Hampus "PromisQ" Abrahamsson. Both new members were hyped players coming from the Challenger Scene, particularly Jwaow from his time on Gamers2 and later MeetYourMakers in the EU LCS. Fnatic
  • Top: Huni
  • Jungle: Reignover
  • Mid: Febiven
  • ADC: Steeelback → Rekkles
  • Support: YellOwStaR
Despite winning the EU LCS Spring Split and a very strong showing at the 2015 Mid-Season Invitational, Fnatic decided to change their ADC. While Pierre "Steeelback" Medjaidi performed decently at ADC, he had many mechanical, positional, and strategic errors throughout the Spring Split. To put Fnatic over the top, the team decided to bring back former EU LCS MVP Martin "Rekkles" Larsson because of his strength as an ADC and synergy with team captain and support Bora "YellOwStaR" Kim. Gambit Gaming
  • Top: Cabochard
  • Jungle: Diamondprox
  • Mid: Betsy
  • ADC: P1noy → FORG1VEN
  • Support: Gosu Pepper (formerly Edward)
Gambit Gaming had a great rebound year after narrowly escaping elimination from the EU LCS last Split. With a roster of new stars and veterans alike, Gambit finished in the Playoffs, but they unfortunately didn't make it beyond that after losing to Unicorns of Love 3-1. As a result, Gambit made the impressive acquisition of reigning EU LCS MVP Konstantinos "FORG1VEN" Tzortziou-Napoleon. With one of the most mechanically gifted players in the world at ADC, Gambit hopes to make a push for the top of EU. ROCCAT
  • Top: Overpow → Steve
  • Jungle: Jankos
  • Mid: Nukeduck
  • ADC: Woolite
  • Support: VandeR
In 2014, ROCCAT came into the EU LCS as one of the most hyped teams, and justified it with finishes in 3rd and 4th in the Spring and Summer Splits. Given the upgrades of Erlend "nukeduck" Holm and Pawel "Woolite" Pruski, it was believed the roster might be a favorite in Europe. But the team had a very rough Split, finishing in 8th Place with a 6-12 record. They decided to shift long time member Remigiusz "Overpow" Pusch to the substitute position and bring in the little-known Etienne "Steve" Michels, formerly of Team-LDLC and ThunderBot SPARTA. ROCCAT expects to have more on their new roster in the coming days. SK Gaming
  • Top: fredy122
  • Jungle: Svenskeren
  • Mid: Fox
  • ADC: FORG1VEN → CandyPanda
  • Support: nRated
After SK Gaming finished the regular season with an impressive 15-3 record, there were high hopes for them going into the Playoffs. However, after FORG1VEN earned the EU LCS MVP award, his team was unable to advance in the Semifinals against Unicorns of Love, and then fell to H2K in the 3rd Place match (both series being 3-2). For team synergy reasons, FORG1VEN was transferred from the team, and SK Gaming's former ADC Adrian "CandyPanda" Wubbelmann will fill in instead.

NA LCS

Team SoloMid, Team Liquid, Team Impulse, Team Dignitas and Team8 were the North American teams that made no changes. Although TSM had a shaky MSI performance, their dominance in NA leaves them hopeful for improvement. Team Liquid and Team Impulse started with rough chemistry issues, but improved dramatically over time. Team8, as a new team, vastly exceeded expectations, and narrowly missed the NA LCS Playoffs. Team Dignitas had some roster changes during the season at jungle (multiple times) and likely was a reason they felt they didn't need to change during the offseason. We'd also like to welcome team Enemy Esports and Team Dragon Knights to the LCS Enemy Esports:
  • Top: Flaresz
  • Jungle: Trashy
  • Mid: Innox
  • ADC: Otter
  • Support: Bodydrop
Team Dragon Knights
  • Top: Seraph
  • Jungle: Kez
  • Mid: Ninja
  • ADC: Emperor
  • Support: Smoothie
Counter Logic Gaming
  • Top: ZionSpartan
  • Jungle: Xmithie
  • Mid: LiNk → Pobelter / HuHi
  • ADC: Doublelift
  • Support: Aphromoo
Oh boy. After simultaneously an impressive regular season and a disappointing Playoffs, CLG hasn't done too much wheeling and dealing this offseason. But a flurry of dramatic posts have revealed a lot of inner organizational turmoil. The team has decided to stay with many its core members despite the trouble, including Yiliang "Doublelift" Peng and Zaqueri "Aphromoo" Black. However after many Splits of investment, CLG and mid laner Austin "LiNk" Shin decided to part ways. Replacing him is not just one player, but two. The CLG organization is trying out a Korea-like structure of time-shared mid laners similar to SKTelecom T1's Sang-hyok "Faker" Lee and Ji-hoon "Easyhoon" Lee. The two players the team selected are Eugene "Pobelter" Park and Jae Hyun "HuHi" Choi. Cloud9
  • Top: Balls
  • Jungle: Meteos
  • Mid: Hai → Incarnati0n
  • ADC: Sneaky
  • Support: LemonNation
Cloud9 stumbled out of the gates in Spring, but managed to finish up strong in 2nd Place despite their inconsistency. The team ultimately decided that they wouldn't be able to succeed with their current lineup, and mid laner Hai "Hai" Lam voluntarily retired to join the organization as Chief Gaming Officer. As a response, C9 held tryouts for their mid position and ended up making one of the most anticipated acquisitions of the offseason. After several years of being banned from League of Legends, Nicolaj "Incarnati0n" Jensen was added to C9's roster. After holding rank 1 on EU Solo Queue, Incarnati0n is touted as one of the best mechanical players in the world. Cloud9's success will depend on if Incarnati0n can adjust to the professional metagame and team play. Gravity
  • Top: Hauntzer
  • Jungle: Saintvicious → Move
  • Mid: Keane
  • ADC: Cop → Altec
  • Support: Bunny FuFuu
Gravity hasn't mentioned a lot about their roster this offseason. Saintvicious tweeted he was likely retiring, but not much else was stated by the team. It was later announced that he joined Team Coast as head coach. The roster that Gravity have submitted for the LCS features former Winterfox ADC Johnny "Altec" Ru and former Edward Gaming academy player Kang "Move" Min-su. Given the lack of public communication by Gravity, we can only speculate why Brandon "Saintvicious" DiMarco and David "Cop" Roberson are leaving the roster. What roster changes are you most excited about? Which teams do you think won the offseason? Let us know on Twitter @lolesports or in the comments below. Tune in to the start of the 2015 LCS Summer Split, where you can see all the rosters in action on May 28, 2015. Frank Fields is a Senior Editor for Riot Games' Esports Web Content team. You'll find him flash charming people in Diamond... or on Twitter where he'd love to talk to you about esports.

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139 Comments

God is love 3165/19/2015, 2:52:06 AM56 votes

I am really sad to see cop leave gravity, he's one of the main reasons why I loved the team to start with when they first got into the LCS item 3070

Emoxes5/19/2015, 2:24:22 AM19 votes

Quite a bit of changes, here is where I see them panning out:

Origen: This team spells promise, with banned players that had time to hone their skills to veterans that still have more left in the tank, this team could go far... I think they will be the most unpredictable team, as high as 3rd and as low as 8th could be where they fall, but considering their dominance of the challenger scene, I'd lean toward the former.

Elements: With the lineup they had, followed by their fall, I think its something in their organization rather than their talent. Maybe they fixed it with getting a more synergistic roster, but I don't see it with the improvements other teams are making... and how strong some of the top teams did in the Spring. Tabzz, their former ADC is a downgrade, I'm not a huge fan of Jwaow, and I think Dexter has seen his glory days pass. PromisQ is promising (I had to) but I don't think he will be able to turn it all around for this squad. I see them finishing ahead of Giants... but honestly, they could finish 9th unless they really did fix their internal issues with this team.

Fnatic: Definite upgrade, he can fit into this organization since he has before, and he just has to learn to play with these new faces. Fnatic is, in my mind, the best organization in Europe, so they shouldn't have much issue getting Rekkles back to his dominance. Expect them to finish first once against unless UoL has more growth than they do.

Gambit: Well SK gave Gambit a silver platter. This one move is huge, because they have a great team otherwise (their mid might still be a bit shaky). Expect 3rd or 4th place for this squad this time around.

Roccat: Good move to fix synergy. But as we learned from M5, teams that all come from one part of Europe and speak one language that isn't English eventually fall until they reform. Roccat maybe in that stage, and with the level of competition, 7th or 8th is probably where they land.

SK: This may have been the single worst move of the off-season. SK has had a history of doing well in the split then under performing during playoffs. It had nothing to do with Forgiven but rather the organization. If there are players to replace, its Fox who did admirably but not as great as some other mids in the scene. They will likely finish the split in 2nd-4th, but if they don't get second, I expect them to fall out first round of the playoffs being the 6th best team when it matters most.

Enemy and TDK: Truly unpredictable, I think both are about equal... anywhere from 5th to 10th... its that hard to say.

CLG: Upgrade... maybe not a major one. Doublelift is past his prime and needs to leave as well. Their strategy of adopting the SK1 strat could work... but its too early to tell. I see them improving from their bad playoffs last split and landing 4th... unless team Liquid wants their curse back.

C9: What a move. Hai knew that despite his shotcalling, despite his teamwork, it wasn't enough. Back when they started, the mid lane competition was not as good as it is now in NA, and his lack of mechanics could not keep up. They got someone who can now. The only question is can they find a shot caller and a leader. If they can, they could even take down TSM, if not, they could stumble as low as 5th. 2nd again is the best prediction I can make.

Gravity: We saw these two retiring eventually, Altec is an upgrade, and Move... its hard to say, but this looks promising IF they can work as a team... 6th place is my prediction, they could go higher or lower dependent on how well they can work as a team and not as individuals (what happened to Winterfox).

I will say this though, despite being from NA and I hate to say it... although the top teams maybe similar talent wise (also assuming they work out kinks for major events so they can show up to them), all in all EU seems strong this split for the first time in awhile.

OHminus5/19/2015, 3:04:30 AM12 votes

Regular season standings: NA:

  1. TL
  2. C9
  3. TSM
  4. TIP
  5. GV
  6. CLG
  7. TDK
  8. T8
  9. DIG
  10. Enemy

EU:

  1. FNC
  2. GMB
  3. H2k
  4. ORIGEN
  5. UOL
  6. SK
  7. ELE
  8. ROC
  9. CW
  10. GIA

I might be a bit too nice on elements here. Feel free to swap CW with them if you want to.

Fulfill Destiny5/19/2015, 3:54:07 AM10 votes

I thought that girl was incarnation for a sec and I got like half a boner

Hąi5/19/2015, 2:58:07 PM7 votes

It's gonna be a hell of a split :)

Yoniho5/19/2015, 7:28:31 AM6 votes

I disagree on Steelback position errors, it team fight positioning was his core strength his laning was his problem.

JHei5/19/2015, 10:04:17 AM5 votes

C9>tsm they gonna prove it this split

jellyfueesh5/19/2015, 3:22:47 AM5 votes

they forgot the T8 roster change with Nien as ADC instead of maplestreet

endtime005/19/2015, 2:00:34 AM4 votes

I hope that the changes will help C9, and Elements; it'll be exciting watching these teams climb back up to the top again.

Doctor Jarvis5/19/2015, 9:21:52 PM4 votes

"For team synergy reasons, FORG1VEN was transferred from the team" That's a fancy way of calling FORG1VEN a douchebag.

The Great Shmoop5/19/2015, 6:44:12 AM4 votes

now before i get down voted for considering Origen so highly, i think that xpeke/soaz both have renewed motivation and that amazing is among the best of junglers, a good fit for the team. mithy/niels are seemingly a very good bot lane and if they keep up and improve their level of synergy they could contest duos like rekkles and yellowstar, the team has 5 carry players, all of them can take a game and run away with it, especially xpeke and amazing. given some time to practice and adjust i can see them placing highly, possibly 1st through 3rd place this split. 1:OG/FNC 2:OG/FNC/H2k 3:OG/H2K/UOL 4:UOL/H2K/GMB 5SK/GMB/EL and i'm too lazy too keep going on that, but there is my take, i'd enjoy a not so toxic response if that isnt too much to ask from our community

Bloodtotemz5/19/2015, 2:26:07 AM4 votes

Looking forward to the roster change to my team C9. If Incarnati0n is anything like what people have been saying, he is going to usher in another age of C9 dominance.

damaskedbutthole5/19/2015, 3:49:36 PM3 votes

Guys this Cloud 9 move I feel is without a doubt the biggest move on the list. (other than Fnatic and Gambit ADC swaps) Cloud 9 had the same roster for 4 splits and we always knew what they could do, we always knew at the least they would manage a top 3 in the absolute worst case scenario.

However we have no clue what Incarnation can even do. As we all know from Seraph from CLG, solo queue excellence does not always translate to LCS success. Again, As we know from the Fnatic rookies talent from a CS team and solo queue can translate to success.

For me, being a huge C9 fan I of course am biased, it is honestly hard to imagine a split where Cloud 9 does not have the supposedly "world class" shot calling, but rather the residual shot calling and they have to rely on their individual talents. We all know Meteos is one of the best junglers in both LCS. We all know Sneaky is a proven consistent player and a great mechanical player. We all know LemonNation is the brain of the team and the skeleton the keeps Sneaky afloat, even though he by no means is a top 3 support in the LCS. We all know Balls can play Rumble and some bruisers, but he struggles with the current meta AP tops. we all know C9 is an all time great NA organization in E-Sports. Is the first time though where we go a whole year without seeing C9 attend a Riot hosted tournament?

SinatraZ5/19/2015, 4:57:50 PM2 votes

NA I think the top 3 will be fought between TL,C9, TSM and TIP. Biggest surprise for NA will be Enemy, I think they have a lot of potential and might end at 4th spot.

EU I think the top 3 will be fought between FNC, OG and H2K. Biggest surprise for EU will be ELements, I think they will make a comeback. I didn't put UOL in the top 3 because in my opinion they had great playoffs but others teams will be more prepared against them this time around.

Also, I can't wait to see FORGIVEN and Edward chemistry lol because they are both agressive and emotive players so it might not work out.

Phoenixegg5/19/2015, 5:41:15 PM2 votes

although i watch more EU ive always liked cloud 9 and their roster. Its a shame that Hai is leaving. THe team had great teamwork and you could tell how close they all were in the gameplay.

Lets hope they can keep the cohesion with the new mid laner.

Also think fnatic should have kept steelback, he really stepped it up against SKT and played worthy of any team.

HgBTEfjD6B5/20/2015, 2:20:54 AM2 votes

Nicolaj "Incarnati0n" Jensen reached fame for being a very skilled high-Elo player known for his extremely toxic and negative attitude in soloqueue. On January 23, 2013, Incarnati0n received an indefinite suspension from all Riot-affiliated events due to behavioral issues.[1] ---- This could be a problem for C9 despite him being a better person now

Zanzan425/20/2015, 4:49:31 AM2 votes

Sweet Jesus, I just read though the entirety of the CLG drama posts by Link/Double/Chauster, and all I can say is that "pro gaming" is anything but professional. I understand that we're dealing with teens/early-20s people here (likely with no real world business experience, since they're so young), but the complete lack of people skills, communication skills, management and leadership skills, and conflict resolution skills on display here would never fly in the real world. Unbelievable.

Son, I am disappoint...

Fuzzy Platypus5/20/2015, 7:43:41 AM2 votes

Aatrox

L7 Archer5/21/2015, 1:07:01 AM1 votes

Team 8 is gonna go all the way this yearRekSai Orianna

ViewtifulCrow5/21/2015, 1:16:55 AM1 votes

WTF COP NOOOOOOOO item 3070 item 3070

Furanki5/21/2015, 10:33:34 AM1 votes

Not really surprised with Elements. After how well they performed last season to how they performed this season's Spring split was like night and day. Something clearly went wrong so perhaps this roster change might clean some of that up, we'll see.

On the NA front, interesting seeing some of the changes that have occurred and it will be worth seeing how CLG fairs with a two-player mid set-up to switch off of for matches; good to see Aphromoo still on the team given he's a fun Support to watch.

All I can say though is its good to see Winterfox (formerly Evil Geniuses) knocked out as their performance last season and this season was lackluster; however, it's truly good to see Team Coast out as it felt more like 9 teams competing with a tenth team that was a guaranteed win for whoever took on Coast. Hopefully these two new teams prove of interest and provide a shakeup to the competition like Team Impulse (formerly LMQ) did last Summer split.

MidriffMustache5/22/2015, 1:11:21 AM1 votes

Zed : PLAY ME BJERGSEN!!!

allupinyobase5/23/2015, 2:47:31 AM1 votes

i hope cop gets picked up...

Raph al Guul5/25/2015, 3:31:05 PM1 votes

http://fantasy.lolesports.com/share/join/league/762304/TGWNkuCEDxAPmlUcJHQR final spot

Raph al Guul5/25/2015, 3:39:44 PM1 votes

four man draft, final spot. We start drafting right now http://fantasy.lolesports.com/share/join/league/762304/TGWNkuCEDxAPmlUcJHQR