I thought Giants were too smart to get cheesed by GamerLegion, I was wrong about that. It’s kind of enraging to watch teams continue to opt into exactly what GamerLegion wants them to do. But credit to them for knowing what they want to do in every game and executing. On the positive side, I finally won a bet on a game where Bando was involved.
AGO Rogue (-257) vs. Misfits Premier (+196)
- Top- AGO Syzgenda vs. MSF Agressivoo The Edge: AGO
- Jungle- AGO Zanzarah vs. MSF Kirei The Edge: MSF
- Mid- AGO Czekolad vs. MSF Ronaldo The Edge: Even
- Bot lane duo- AGO Woolite and Trymbi vs. MSF Jezu and Targamas The Edge: AGO
If this match had been played after week 1 of groups, I firmly believe Misfits Premier would have been the favorites. Now, after a 1-2 week they are nearly a +200 dog? I smell an overcorrection. To me, there’s no way that if these teams play 100 games AGO wins 67+ of them. They are marginally the better and more consistent team, but these odds are way out of whack.
Misfits are a mid-jungle focused team who play like all the best teams in the world right now by getting mid priority and stacking early drakes. AGO Rogue typically puts Zanzarah onto a supportive tank jungler and tries to get ahead in their side lanes to scale up for late game teamfights. To me, Misfits’ style is a better way to win the game right now, but if executed correctly AGO’s style could directly counter Misfits. In their loss to 7more7, they essentially lost the game through the top side as Sinmivake played Camille and demolished Agressivoo. Camille is exactly the kind of champion Syzgenda thrives on. He is, at heart, an old-school carry top who loves to outplay and get solo kills.
Misfits will feel they have an advantage in the jungle matchup here. Kirei has shown the range to play and win on a range of carry junglers like Nidalee, Hecarim, Graves, and Kindred. If he can get seriously ahead of Zanzarah, games could snowball in their favor. Zanzarah has not shown any ability to contest any of those carry junglers making it near impossible for AGO to ban him out.
In the bottom lane, Woolite has been a reliable carry for AGO. In games where they have gotten to late game teamfights, they are almost always coming out on top thanks to his positioning and damage output. Jezu and Targamas are no pushovers, but are not asked to carry their teams the way that Woolite is. If this series becomes late game and bot lane focused, I think AGO have the edge. However, if the series is mid-jungle focused on dragons, I would give it to Misfits Premier.
Either way, I don’t think the teams are as far apart as these odds so I will be on the dog. AGO is meaningfully ahead in stats I value like GSPD, but in a tournament where the quality of the teams varies between the groups, stats can be misleading. Woof woof.
The Picks: MSF +1.5 Games (-170) 2u, MSF ML (+195) 1u
Mousesports (-305) vs. K1ck (+215)
- Top- MSE Tolkin vs. K1ck IBo The Edge: K1ck
- Jungle- MSE Obsess vs. K1ck Shlatan The Edge: Even
- Mid- MSE Lider vs. K1ck Matislaw The Edge: Even
- Bot lane duo- Jeskla and Promisq vs. Puki Style and Mystiques The Edge: Even
Here are some matchups that you could have gotten +215 or better on the dog in the summer playoffs: Suning vs. Top, EG vs. Cloud 9, LGD vs. IG, Dignitas vs. TSM, etc. Not only are there teams that pulled off the upset in there, but those are playoff favorites playing against teams that most people expected to lose in the first round. That’s not even close to the case here. I think if you asked anyone who has been consistently watching EU Masters Summer who are some of the teams with a chance to win it all: Mouse and K1ck would be two of the most mentioned teams. So why is this priced like K1ck is a team from Luxembourg’s 3rd division?
The counterargument here is that Mouse was unbelievably dominant in their group. They went 5-1 and had a GSPD of 11.2%. When they won, they absolutely destroyed. They are inarguably a favorite in this tournament, but I do have my doubts about the quality of competition in their group. The only other team with a positive GSPD in their group was the Vodafone Giants who they split 1 to 1 with. Fnatic Rising and Intrepid fox were never real challengers here.
Their opponents, K1ck, were in arguably the toughest group in the tournament with Spring champions LDLC, an LEC academy team, and a surprisingly feisty Italian team. Despite this, they had a GSPD of 7.2% and went 4-2 with a couple of very close losses. K1ck was my pick to win the whole thing before the start and they haven’t given me any clear reasons to doubt that yet.
Although mouse’s talent could easily be better on the day, I don’t think anyone can credibly argue they have a serious talent advantage over the long run. All of the players on both teams have looked near the top of their positions in the tournament so far, trying to split hairs and identify a win condition there is a reach in my opinion.
I could go on, but I think you get the idea: this one is too close to call, but priced like it’s David and Goliath. I want to be clear about something though because in esports you end up backing big dogs a lot– I am not guaranteeing a K1ck win. In fact, I think they are slightly more likely to lose this matchup than win, but sports betting is about finding edges over implied odds. I think this is a bad line, but if K1ck get 2-0’d or win 2-0 themselves, that will prove nothing besides one data point over a long period of time.
The Picks: K1ck +1.5 (-150) 3u, K1ck ML (+215) 2u, K1ck 2-0 (+550) 1u
Major LoL Soccer blog 