he has no actual counterplay
Destroy his barrels.
It´s literally one of the easiest things ever considering Phantom Barrels, be it the one part or the barrel-barrel-Q-barrel are either too difficult to pull off or simply leave him without barrels.
stay undertower and farm with barrels from distance
He won´t be one-shotting minion waves with barrels until Tri-Force and it´ll only apply to ranged minions unless he AAs the minions to get them to lower HP for barrel Parrrleys.
his Q deals 700+ dmg with 3 items (when crt )
and his Q's cdr is just 3 seconds
Considering those will almost always be Triforce, Ghostblade and IE, he will have to be plenty lucky to get a crit Q.
Also, he is one of the few champions who can cap on CDR the fastest.
he has his "oranges" that remove ALL KIND of CC and heal him greatly
The lower HP he is. He uses it to remove a CC while having 75% HP he´ll heal up to 80%, tops. And it´s always been a trademark of GP along with his ult.
he has a global ult which means free kills on bot lane at some point
If he takes TLD, which already means he's basically screaming at his team he won´t be winning lane but will be KS'ing or at least getting assists by helping all over the map.
How is he even balanced?
at least his barrels/Q shouldn't be able to crt
He's balanced because he wins very few of the matchups against top laners. Meta or otherwise. That´s why most GP mains take him mid. He can hold his own against mages, can rush GA against Zed/Talon and absolutely shits on Kass and Yasuo.
And his Q crits because it's considered a basic attack, like Yasuo's Q.
