I mean DRX always cook up something, would be surprised if they have a bad season next year (like making 0 internationals) but idk if they'll be able to become a trophy winning team either

also he's still showing up on attack (+47 kills on attack this tournament) just even more so on defense (+80)

NRG basically won almost every close round (eg 7 out of 8 clutches) + MIBR saved more and lost to time sometimes

top 10 paycheck stealers

I mean this one was pretty lucky though, they won 7 out of 8 clutches and pretty much every round NRG won was close whilst MIBR won a lot of flawless or near flawless rounds. In my opinion the teams were closely matched but the team that played better valorant lost today (doesn't take anything away from NRG, they've been amazing this entire tournament).

Wdym 3rd grand final appearance?

Boaster played 4 finals already and Chronicle played 5? If you're talking just champs it's Boaster 0 and Chronicle 1.

Edit: nvm youre talking this season and counting regional grand finals mb

Did not expect this to be so TRUE

I say you should just fully embrace the EMEA bias, go with Kaajak as well xD

They've won more rounds than MIBR at Toronto already, now it's just BLG on fraud watch really

I'm not sure NRG should be included amongst champs contenders just yet. They're very solid but they honestly had 2 close series against middle of the pack teams that they could have easily lost.

For me personally Trent was the best player for the first 2/3rds of the year. Riens was consistently great for TH even when they were struggling but tbh Trent was consistently great for G2 as well and they saw much more success. I would say recently Riens has been better than trent but even then trent hasn't been bad at all, it's just that other G2 players shone a bit more brightly in stage 2. Maybe if G2 get eliminated and Riens has a deep run playing like he is now I'll put in Riens but otherwise almost definitely gonna go with Trent.

he was bad at Toronto and for one game against LEV but other than that I think he's been stellar with a team filled with basically rookies. Maybe overrating him a bit but I would say for anything up to Toronto he clears something easily and slightly better than kaajak. Then for Toronto kaajak clears something who clears aspas. Then for stage 2 and onwards something a bit better than kaajak who was a bit better than aspas.

If aspas is clearly the best out of the 3 at this tournament I think I'll pick him but otherwise you're definitely right that he doesn't deserve it.

team of the season

oh damn, then chichoo is just struggling my bad

Duelist: Kaajak/aspas/something
Initiator: Trent/(Riens)
Controller: Valyn/Keiko
Sentinel: Alfajer/nAts/(d4v41)
Flex: f0rsaken/(Chronicle)

between brackets means less likely they'll make my team of the season unless they have a giga champs performance and the other contenders flop a bit

thoughts?

I do think getting an IGL in would be nice though. Chichoo's IGLing isn't at a level that justifies the hit his personal performance takes when he's taking up that IGL role so I think it would be best if they get a new IGL in (not sure for who, probably nobody or jieni I guess).

I swear this narrative comes back every year

Seychelles flag is just so pretty 😍

1. Trent - one bad game at champs does not take away from the entirity of the season he's had so far, probably player of the year if G2 win champs with him playing well.
2. Riens - insane consistency in a season where TH have been anything but, he's quickly becoming one of the all time initiator goats with 2 incredible seasons already
3. Trexx - this one is the toughest and I do think players like Crashies, Verno and others deserve a shout but for me Trexx is a very slept on player that's improved TL a lot

So aspas isn't in your goat conversation?

Leviatan, not even sure why I dont like them since I did in the past but nowadays I never find myself rooting for them or believing in them

How on earth is 2G above EG??? I swear they were always in the same groups and every team 2G beat, EG beat as well + EG beat 2G every time they played eachother

Like how on earth is 2G 29th out of 48 teams with only 2 wins all season, one of them against Furia.

I was saying I thought all CN teams would get eliminated and everyone laughed me out of the building saying things like "EDG will go on a run again" and "BLG's group is so easy they'll definitely make it".

WHERE THOSE PEOPLE AT NOW? STICK BY YOUR GUNS PEOPLE AND DEFEND YOUR TEAMS AND OPINIONS! THEYRE NOT OUT YET THERES HOPE!!!

The good old days for Americas, basically before it was Americas

But who would've thought it would be NRG and MIBR lol

I feel like a lot of flex and senti players have a decent number of games on controller as well, mainly viper but I assume you don't want to count players like Less, nAts, Chronicle, f0rsaken, etc. for this though (if you would all of those guys would be decent shouts imo)

only considering people who are or have for a long time been permanently on controller I would suggest the following names:

• valyn
• smoggy
• kingg
• karon

could definitely go with different names, Karon hasn't been in tier 1 super long but he's had 2 excellent seasons already so I thought wth why not

if XLG bomb out DRG stays up I think so they'll still need to win a game no matter what

he was 100T's 3rd best player

John is Sen's second best player and that's not even taking IGLing into account

I feel like Im cursing these teams with Joblife and EXL not even making ascension...

beyn is the new foxy9

I loved the old logo, the cool purple one

loved the 2023 roster as well, they never did anything with it mostly because Koldamenta was so much below the level needed for tier 1 at that point but still Starxo, Sheydos, Trexx core had potential if Sheydos and Trexx didn't start beefing

Yeah the EMEA challengers seems weird. Like first of all why is there different group sizes (JL had a 25% chance of making playoffs when Mandatory had a 33% chance for example) and then also why are the MENA teams only coming into the mix now with a shitton of points from regionals already?

Are they not going to Ascension? Was kinda rooting for them

My favourite player is SUYGETSU

One thing I love about him is how he won the final round of Masters Copenhagen in 2022

true, he's also been incredibly good and has some deeper tournament runs than Keiko

I guess both of these players get (unjustly) overshadowed by their teammates at times. I will say I think Keiko's regional numbers are a bit more impressive since there's no one close to G2 in Americas except maybe Sen whilst TL have consistently been challenged harder but then again trent's international numbers are both better and more impressive since he's done it in deeper runs against better teams

perhaps it all comes down to their champs performances

Mited will shock the world

yeah NV's best case is lowkey not winning it this year, keeping the team together and winning it next year

Yeah, I never knew how to rate the Apeks players since they were farming everyone so hard that the top 5 in Polaris would just be the 5 Apeks players so it was like are these guys actually good or is the competition just that bad? Turns out it was both

went to look this up and it made me realize TL have played KOI seven times in the past 3 years lol

beginning of the season it felt like you never knew which ruxic you were going to get, half the games he would be putting up numbers like he did all split this time around but the other half of the games/maps he would be bottom of the scoreboard looking like he's giga throwing

idk if this is form or him finding his footing leading to more consistency but he's very fun to watch, genuinely wins his team so many rounds that they should have no chance of winning

I don't see him being discussed as one of the best players of the season, half the time people aren't even putting him as the best Liquid player (tbf nAts is also VERY good)

I would say he was slightly above average with some in form periods where he showed glimpses of what he's been doing all year this season.

• Kickoff: 1.26 rating (1st out of 61 players)
• Bangkok: 1.09 rating (7th out of 41 players)
• Stage 1: 1.09 rating (6th out of 62 players)
• Toronto: 1.10 rating (12th out of 61 players)
• Stage 2: 1.21 rating (2nd out of 62 players)

Overall rating for the season: 1.17 (1.19 regional // 1.10 international)
for reference, yay had a 1.22 rating in 2022

Keiko honestly doesn't get enough glaze for the season he's having, if TL make a deep run at champs with him putting up his regular numbers he's my player of the year for sure.

GE Aspas

Demon1 (smokes) on a Russian team with Vookashu (senti), Rarga (duelist), Kr1stal (initiator) and Shao (flex)

T1 and RRQ played 2 extremely close games very recently with both of them winning 1 (it was only like 3 rounds difference over 6 maps combined) so to me they're a very similar level. GiantX vs. Fnatic is a tougher comparison because Fnatic did say they were limit testing in play offs since they had already qualified however it's not like they were pulling out comps and strats that were that far off what we're used to seeing from them and yet GX still won 2-0 against them. Overall you would probably back Fnatic because of the experience and caliber of players they have you would probably want to avoid them more than GX I guess.

Still overall it's genuinely not that much of a difference in my personal opinion.

I'm not going to lie I didn't even think GX were going to make it so I'm already happy flickless gets to be there. Still hope they can get some maps maybe a win but don't think they'll make it out of groups.

Only way that the draw ciuld have been better for them was if it was GX/T1 instead of RRQ/FNC I guess but tbh it's not much difference I think.

MIBR are 4th seed so they were always playing a 1st seed. I'll take BLG over TL or PRX any day of the week bro.