LoL North American LCS: Week One Review
The first week of the NA LCS is behind us and much like the EU week, there were some exciting new developments with new teams on the scene and also very familiar themes.
TSM dropped the first game of the season and made a comeback in the second. CLG started hot and ended cold, C9 thrives with Hai starting and falls flat without him. None of this is new and exactly what we have come to expect from these teams, despite their best efforts to change.
Other than Immortals and Impulse it is difficult to get a great picture of how this season might look, but let’s give it a try.
Immortals
We’ll start with the easy one. The only downside with Immortals is that they may win too easily to produce may points, still they will always score some points making everyone on the roster perfect for cash games. Huni and Reignover in particular make great picks in any format. They also hold their opponents to low scores, against Impulse they not only held their score low, but drove it into the negative.
Team SoloMid
What is a DFS player to do with TSM? A super team with players that traditionally score very well in all positions. However, in week 1 TSM managed to score less than their opponent, not only in their loss, but also in their win. Will TSM improve? I think so, and I expect them to finish strong. When this improvement happens and whether or not they will be a good source of fantasy points remains to be seen.
TSM does have some upside though. They are very tenacious and will keep fighting even when losing a game ensuring that they put up some fantasy points. This combined with their raw talent makes them a decent choice in cash games.
Counter Logic Gaming
After removing their star ADC and mid laner, CLG’s future was uncertain. After week 1, it’s still uncertain. At least we know they have a very high ceiling to go with a very low floor. Not only did CLG manage to generate the highest number of points in the league with their win over TSM (205), they also managed to claim the highest point deficit in their lost to DiG where they were outscored by 127.
These stats make CLG reasonable choices in GPP, but not in cash unless they dramatically outclass their opponent.
Team Liquid
Liquid is doing their best to frustrate DFS players by running a 10 man roster making it very difficult to get a good read on them. It does appear that Piglet will be a good choice in all formats. Anyone else on the team comes with a high degree of risk.
Watching the starting lineups page for TL’s roster updates could make for good contrarian GPP plays. Especially in a favorable matchup.
Renegades
This new team has shown that they can play with the best teams, but it appears that outside of their bot lane combo of Freeze and Remi not too many points will be scored. The Freeze and Remi combo looks to be a solid pick in all but the worst matchups.
Dignitas
Dig is the biggest surprise of week one. Expected to be very weak yet Dig took a convincing win off of CLG and competed well with NRG. Veterans Shiphtur and KiWiKiD seem to be the bright spots here. It’s to early to say how Dig will fair through the rest of the season, they had a great week one, but I would draft DiG players with caution.
Cloud 9
Hai is the Brent Favre of eSports; he just can’t stay retired. However, Hai has a great reason to keep coming back. C9 looks fantastic with him playing and terrible when he is backstage. This makes drafting easy, watch the starting lineups page and if Hai is starting pick up some shares of C9 players, otherwise stay away.
It is worth noting that historically C9 does not score large chunks of fantasy points, even in their wins making them more suited to cash than GPP. They also give up very few points, so it is very dangerous to target players facing C9.
NRG eSports
NRG is off to a great start and the only team other than immortals to start their season 2-0. Good news for fantasy is that they did so while scoring a decent amount of fantasy points. Impact and Altec have always been high scoring players and will continue to be that way. How consistent GBM will play remains to be seen.
The only issue with NRG is we don’t know how they will play from behind and if they will be able to score well in a loss.
Echo Fox
Yet another new face in the NA LCS. Echo Fox bring some veteran players along with Korean imports. How well they will mesh remains to be seen. In a favorable matchup Keith can be expected to score very well, but I would stop drafting Echo Fox after Keith.
Team Impulse
Impulse has been called the worst LCS team in history and week 1 seems to support that claim. This is largely due to the owners attempting to sell the team, but failing and needing to put together a roster at the last second. Stay away at all times, I don’t expect an Impulse player to score well at any time.
Even drafting against Impulse could be tricky as games may be over so quickly that there isn’t enough time to accumulate significant points.
In summary, after week one, we should be targeting players from:
• Team SoloMid
• Counter Logic Gaming
• DiG (as matchups allow)
•NRG eSports
• Immortals
• Cloud 9 (with Hai)
Avoid Players from:
• Impulse
• Liquid
• Renegades
• Echo Fox
• Cloud 9 (without Hai)
Target players playing against:
• Impulse
• Renegades
• Echo Fox
• Team Liquid
Avoid players playing against:
• Immortals
•NRG eSports
• Cloud 9
Matchup Dependent, avoid taking players from these teams when they are facing a superior opponent, but do target players on these teams when playing weaker or even teams.
• Team SoloMid
• Dignitas
•CLG