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EARLY PICK (This match is on Tuesday)
While we only have one previous year data for the play-in stage we do have multiple years of week one data at our disposal. Historically most of the upsets and unseen winds come in week one of the World Championship. Think of Albus Nox Luna, Cloud 9, Gigabyte Marines, etc. although we only have one year of sample size we saw some similar things in the play-in stage last year. Last year Lyon beat Gambit and Dire Wolves defeated Team One from Brazil. The nature of best of one's is that they are incredibly high variance. It's the primary reason I had to cut wages in half for the Summer Split of both NA and EU LCS this year. I got absolutely crushed going to have the on single game series. Because of the volatility of best ones we see a lot of "upsets." So what's the trick in calling the upsets? Some people believe in tournament situations like this where there are a lot of heavy favorites you just go a low unit wager across the board on the underdogs for every single game and if a couple of them hit you can end up netting money. Similar to last year however, this year's plane stays looks more or less all but wrapped up to me and the only real value were going to find is in the number two versus number three seeds with one very important exception that happens on day one which leads me to my first selection for the World Championship.…
I'm putting two units on Turkey's Supermassive at +233 to defeat G2 eSports. For those of you that read my pre-tournament power rankings you'd see that Supermassive were my top selection for a wildcard team to make it into the main event (except for Phong Vu who are already in). Three of the best Turkish players of all time with multiple years of world experience as well as veteran Korean players GBM and Snowflower make this a formidable team from a region that has historically been relatively competitive at the World Championship. While G2 looked significantly improved in the European regional gauntlet they still showed some weaknesses in the armor. They made a lot of mistakes while attempting to play up-tempo and while it's admirable that they were trying to adjust and showed some proficiency in doing so they were far from perfect. If G2 try to play the trademark late game style against the team with excellent macro like Supermassive they're going to push this game very close to 50-50.
On paper I don't think this line looks too far out of whack but when you think about how these two teams play, the historic unpredictability of the early tournament, the volatility of best of one's, and a team in Supermassive that has the chops to compete against EU LCS teams I really like the chances for an upset here. I legitimately think Supermassive could challenge for playoff spots in the EU LCS if they played there. This is very likely the only #1 seed upset that I'll be playing in the entire group stage. I just really like the spot on day one and Supermassive are quite likely the best of all the wildcard region teams in the world.
Moneyline: Supermassive +233 (2 units)
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EARLY PICK (This match is on Tuesday)
With the banning of Shernfire for two games I think this more or less cripples Dire Wolves already long chances of getting out of the play in stage. I really love Inifinity who I had similarly ranked to them at -116 to take them down in this situation. I know Dire Wolves will have time to prepare with a sub and all and perhaps there isn't much film for Infinity to see but I prefer continuity here.
Moneyline: Infinity eSports -116 (4 units)
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Cloud 9 had a 56% first blood percentage during the season but towards the end of the regular split and during both the playoffs and regional gauntlet run they were often victims of first blood as other teams tried to jump out to early leads on them. Historically during the World Championship, the wild card teams will often play aggressive and try to get out to an early lead when they feel outclassed. Kabum had similar first blood percentages to Cloud 9 anyway. I'm willing to drop a unit on the first blood here even if I think Cloud 9 will win this game.
PROP: Kabum First Blood @ +139 (1 unit)
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This one is more of a shot in the dark but I'm liking Gambit at plus odds against G-Rex. This is mostly just a gut feeling bet not one for value or anything but I feel like Gambit could upset the LMS squad. I think this line is accurate and that G-Rex will likely win but call it a hunch I like Gambit for a potential upset here.
Moneyline: Gambit +122 (1 unit)
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