Brand has been played in mid lane once ever in the past 2 years of LCS and he lost

As far as I can tell from the stats on this site http://oracleselixir.com/

I really enjoy Brand's playstyle but he can't deal with very many midlaners. He is bad against any champion with mobility or any champion that outclasses him in either poke or waveclear. His poke and waveclear are both above average but ultimately there are going to be better picks for either of those things.

Here are some major issues I see with Brand.

• His ult is fizzled by invulns. So if you have your ult bouncing in a teamfight somebody can save their allies by using hourglass or another invuln to stop further bounces. The difference is if another AoE like Ziggs ult is coming down and you use hourglass, you only save yourself. Same with any other AoE. Only Brand has this problem. I believe this problem has always hindered Brand severely in high level play. The better your opponents the more likely they are to just shut down the ult and there's nothing you can do about it. There are so many other AoE champs you can pick who do not have to deal with that and they often have mobility or defense too.

• His %hp damage isn't doing him any favors. It helps him as a support since it lets him get away with less items. As a mid it doesn't do that much for him. You never face a champion in mid that it's good against. Maybe top, but he's not mobile or tanky enough to go top.

• His itemization forces him to give up defensive utility. His damage output is balanced around the fact that he has good synergy with Liandry's and Rylai's but that means he will be giving up a lot of damage by rushing an Hourglass or Banshee's. He's less able to adapt his build based on defensive needs. Other mages don't have this problem even though they also tend to have naturally less vulnerable kits (better mobility or kiting). Regardless of how you feel about mage itemization, you have to admit that Brand is suffering more than others due to how dependent he is on Liandry's and Rylai's.

• His AoE for both waveclear and teamfights is either matched or outclassed by champs with more utility or just more reliable/better CC and more reliable AoE.

It really sucks whenever mage itemization is improved and it's supposed to help champions who are having trouble but every time we just see more of the champs who were dominant before due to mobility or utility.

So I expect that to happen again and Brand will remain only viable as support. Other champs will abuse item changes too well for Brand to compete.