Lev Sen Loud in no order atp tbh
Will wait to rank EG until they announce all 5 are staying, although thinking about it, if they lose say c0m or b0tstio it could lead to flyuh even though he just signed that contract.. idk tho if the buyout offer was reasonable idk how you say no to a champs winner
rest of the teams are just straight ass in NA next year c9 will probably be top 5 again though
early pred is that LEV win league Sen win playoffs loud qualify third
Yeah but like guy below said they haven't played in tier 1 for quite some time. Some people are calling them the best Americas team heading into next season but for what? Last time they played in tier 1 was NA LCQ 2022 and they kind of got rolled by 100T in the finals who then ended up getting grouped in Champs. Obviously they did well in tier 2 and would have done decent in Americas VCT league, but its still the same 4 + new guy and placing them into the tier 1 pool is hard.
It's not like this is Gentle Mates. This exact core was the second to third best team in NA the year before. They've swapped duelists twice and been on top both times. Now they're bringing in an even better duelist. We know they can compete at the T1 level, this isn't some random championship run. Valyn and Trent were rated as top 3 in their role heading into 2023. Jawgemo is a world champion who, in most peoples eyes, is the current best Raze player in the world(Victor, Derke do have an argument in my opinion but are still below Jawg). With these guys I don't see how you can rate them anywhere below Sentinels. They should be in everyone's top 4 preseason.
3rd best NA in 2022 doesn't mean much when its also the exact same core + 1. NRG was only team doing something outside of XSET in Champions. The Guard won stage 1, but flopped in Reykjavik, didn't do anything in stage 2 and then got rolled by 100T in LCQ finals and didnt look good doing it, and after that been playing in tier 2. And where were Valyn and Trent rated as top 3? Americas tier 2? G2 can be good and likely will do fine in Americas, but rating them high high like some people is bit weird to me.
How many IGLs would you have taken over Valyn coming into 2023? FNS? Dephh? There's no one else you can argue
How many sova players would you have taken over Trent? Crashies? Maybe BcJ? Again that's still top 3. And them being the same core is the exact reason why it means something. We have literally seen this team be at the top of NA. That's the whole point. They aren't some randoms, this is a core that has been together for 2 years and has been as successful as you can ask.
I think Loud will be good this year, any team is saadhak would be competitive.
However I think the ceiling of the roster is lower than last years roster.
G2 would be my dark horse pick, good core + probably picking up a strong duelist player.
Lev has a lot of moving parts, I actually like both pickups a lot also the coaching staff looks great.
The main issue is the language change + coaching changes, which look to be good long term but they will take a while to implement.
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