LEC (Europe) Summer 2019 Pre-Season Tier List

LEC LCS Summer 2019 Pre-Season Tier List

My European tier list is definitely more of a tier list than actual rankings. Other than G2 being the best almost anything could happen so I've grouped the teams into tiers but don't pay attention as much to the exact order.

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C Tier

Rogue eSports

Projected Starters: Finn, Inspired, Larssen, HeaQ, Vander

Subs: Profit (top), Woolite (ADC)

I'm a huge fan of Larssen and after a rough Spring split I can only see this team improving but it might not be enough in the grand scheme of things. This team looks fine but that's about it. Not too much to say here.

Excel eSports

Projected Starters: Expect, Caedrel, Mickey, Hjarnan, KaSing

Subs: Send0o (top), Taxer (jungle), Special (mid), Exile (mid), Jeskla (ADC), Mystiques (support)

ExceL made some moves in the offseason and are looking to compete a lot more than they did. I actually think this roster has a lot of potential with the expected starters I have listed here and could end up surprising some people if things break in favor of them. I think of the C tier teams I like Excel's upside the most.

Misfits Gaming

Projected Starters: sOAZ, Maxlore, Febiven, HansSama, Gorilla

Subs: Lider (mid)(not listed but good chance we see him)

Misfits are probably the team I'm most likely to be wrong about on this list but they honestly looked terrible last season and I'm having a hard time convincing myself that they improve by enough to surpass some of the other teams that should also improve. I have loved a lot of these players at different points in their careers and even thought some of them were underappreciated at various times but HansSama and Maxlore are being a bit held back by the looks of it. I don't know this team is just weird and they could easily figure things out and look like one of the B tier teams just as often as they end up where I have them in C tier. We'll see what's left in the tank here but this team needs to work on its communication and build chemistry before we even discuss the individuals as much as we already have.

SK Gaming

Projected Starters: Sacre, Selfmade, Pirean, Crownshot, Dreams

Subs: 

I think with all of the offseason drama surrounding SK Gaming it'd be easy to write this team off but in my experience in both traditional sports and esports, teams tend to rally around and develop an "us against the world" mentality more often than they fall apart. I expect that with this team. A great mix of seasoned veterans and youngbloods with a lot of potential I expect them to take a step forward.

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B- Tier

Splyce

Projected Starters: Vizicsacsi, Xerxe, Humanoid, Kobbe, Norskeren

Subs: Orome (top)

Splyce and Origen I'm grouping together in the B- tier as teams that are just rock solid and likely to make playoffs but quite limited in their potential to exceed expectations just based on potential of their rosters and the previous highs we've seen. Splyce have perhaps been a bit more impressive than I'm giving them credit for. They're masters of their own style and with a metagame that allows for that to some extent more than it did in Spring I could see myself being dead wrong on Splyce yet again but take this ranking, as well as Origen's, as my way of saying "I don't ever see this team winning the split."

Origen

Projected Starters: Alphari, Kold, Nukeduck, Patrik, Mithy

Subs: 

Origen are well coached and have solid veteran players but I think if a lot of the higher potential teams realize even some of that that they'll finish in the middle somewhere. I was actually impressed with Origen quite a bit in the Spring but I think they're a bit capped in how good they could be. They got a little hot and had a good read on the meta leading to a strong 2nd place finish but I think that was a bit more flukey than necessarily an expected result. Still they're a good team and will likely be in the playoffs.

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B Tier

FC Schalke 04

Projected Starters: Odoamne, Trick, Abbedagge, Upset, IgNar

Subs: Memento (jungler)

This ranking has a lot of realized potential baked into it. I think Schalke should be significantly better than they were on average in Spring. We saw the highs but also terrible lows. Simply put, I expect more of the highs and fewer of the lows. I think if Schalke play at their ceiling they're a the best non-G2 team in the LEC but it's just a question of whether or not they get there. The biggest question mark going into Spring was Abbedagge and he was excellent. If he can maintain and the team can up their consistency over all they'll be a force to be reckoned with.

Vitality

Projected Starters: Cabochard, Mowgli, Jiizuke, Attila, Jactroll

Subs: Saken (mid), Istari (mid)

I love Vitality to bounce back and after a fairly disappointing finish to the Spring split including some injury issues with Jiizuke I think a lot of people are sleeping on this team (I love them in week one!). Vitality are aggressive and just finished up a Chinese boot camp where they hopefully picked up a few tricks to add to their already impressive scrapping repertoire. I love the way this team plays and their style preys on some of the other middling and upper LEC teams like Schalke, Splyce, and Origen. I expect them to edge those teams out and perhaps even Fnatic as well.

Fnatic

Projected Starters: Bwipo, Broxah, Nemesis, Rekkles, Hylissang

Subs: 

Perhaps the team with the highest upside. Fnatic looked outstanding in the second half of Spring split once they figured some things out and other than a really weird playoff series looked like they were destined to face down G2. I think this team is excellent and outside of ocassionally getting tunnel vision for certain strategies are surprisingly versatile compared to how they're typed by most viewers and commentators.

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S Tier

G2 eSports

Projected Starters: Wunder, Jankos, Caps, Perkz, Mikyx

Subs: Thebaus (top)

G2 are legitimately one of the best teams in the world and I don't think winning MSI was a fluke. It's why I bet them going into the tournament and went so heavy on them during the knockout stage. This team is creative, aggressive, versatile, and, perhaps above all else, just have straight up ballers at every position. They're everything we thought they'd be and more and they're honestly two tiers better than everyone else in Europe to me.

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LEC Rankings Final Prediction

C Tier
10) Rogue
9) ExceL
8) Misfits
7) SK Gaming
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B- Tier
6) Splyce
5) Origen

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B Tier

4) Schalke 04
3) Vitality
2) Fnatic

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S Tier

1) G2 eSports