The B5 Discrimination Is Out of Hand

Just lost a match in Team Builder doing all I could as Garen when both other lanes lost and then my team couldn't not feed all 3 carries (Irelia, Viktor, Tristana). Irelia was a certified idiot, ulting me almost exclusively when I was at full HP, and I made her look foolish in laning phase, so her finishing the match 15/7/9 (compared to my 13/5/5) pained me.

Funny thing is, she was the one talking the most crap after the match. "I cringe at Garen," she said. "Only plays Garen and B5. He's like the stereotype." (Looks at their stats) Bronze I, but lower overall win rate than me (47% to my 48%). Granted, they have 99 matches to my 223, but still. With just Garen I have 119 matches played and a higher win rate (53%). The only champions with a 50% or higher and over 2 matches for them are Udyr (12-8) and Jayce (4-1). With my 7 most played champions, I'm 104-104, and this person's 29-35. And I could go on.

But because they're a B1 (AKA, suck a tiny bit less rank wise) they feel all high and mighty. I see this sort of insanity all the time. It's to the point where I'm no longer surprised if a B4 dismisses me in match, even when I'm outperforming him, because I'm B5. I thought it was understood that bronze is bronze, and your position in it doesn't matter all that much in the grand scheme of things. Heck, I see people call silver just a continuation of bronze, saying that you don't really escape that "ELO Hell" people like to talk about and get to where people know what they're doing until you at least reach gold. So why still so much discrimination?

I'll be the first to admit I still have plenty of room to improve. I don't have delusions of grandeur or anything. Sure, I believe I can take a silver with my main, Garen, as I've done it in the past in team builder when my higher MMR friends made it so I drew one. But I know that, overall, I have nowhere to go but up. And being in that position, I find myself sympathetic to others in my situation, and I don't think I'll ever stop being sympathetic even if I reach gold or higher.

If someone's B5 and has a sub-40% win rate, with no champions over 50%, poke fun if you so please. For everyone else, try to look a little further past their rank, please. You never know what other factors could be at play and, if you're silver or bronze, whether or not they could still beat you. I'm being 100% honest when I say this isn't an attempt to boost my own ego, since not being a more well rounded player is what I've sought most to improve, but if I could just play my mains every match in ranked I'd probably be up there with that Irelia in B1. It's when I have to go outside my comfort zone that I fall on my face, which is why I've barely played any ranked at all the past month or two and focused almost solely on improving at the roles I used to be least comfortable at, namely support.