It’s the last week before playoffs and it’s time to take a look back at my power rankings from the beginning of the season:
LEC
- G2
- Fnatic
- Rogue
- Mad Lions
- Misfits
- Vitality
- XL
- S04
- SK
- Astralis
LCS
- Cloud9
- Team Liquid
- 100 Thieves
- Evil Geniuses
- TSM
- Flyquest
- Immortals
- CLG
- Dignitas
- Golden Guardians
So far, not bad overall. I had a couple of misses with SK and Dignitas, but I don’t expect either of those teams to seriously challenge in the playoffs. I wish I had TSM flipped with 100T and EG, but made a small bet on all of them to win the split and that still feels pretty live for TSM. It should leave us with some profitable spots going forward. Speaking of which, I wanted to try and come up with a good number for each team to win their split for this week’s introduction before going into the week’s bets. Here’s how I’m thinking of each team’s chances at taking their Spring Trophy to MSI:
LEC
G2 (75%) -300
Rogue (15%) +566
Fnatic (5%) +1900
Mad Lions (5%) +1900
LCS
C9 (45%) +122
TL (35%) +186
TSM (20%) +400
I know I have bet against G2 a little bit this regular season stating that their advantages are relatively insignificant in a one-off against Rogue. I don’t believe that in a best of 5 playoff environment. 75% is probably conservative for how much better G2 is than the rest of the LEC, but it leaves space for the possibility of them catching a bad meta. If I see G2 to win the split around -200 at all next week, I will be placing a sizable wager because I doubt that number will be attainable by betting their individual matchups.
In the LCS, I think it’s somewhat close, but that the advantages that TSM, TL and C9 have over the league will be expanded in a playoff format. Evil Geniuses is just too inconsistent to win a best of 5 against any of those teams and 100 Thieves just have one very clear exploitable weakness in the mid-jungle duo that will get abused in the playoffs. I will be looking to buy out of my EG and 100T futures bets with a C9 bet if I can get them at any kind of plus money. Onto last week’s recap:
I got a little wacky on Sunday in the LCS because I wanted some action. It was a dumb mistake and it won’t happen again. Here’s my favorite plates this week
LEC
Bet: Rogue ML vs. XL parlayed w/ SK ML vs. Astralis (-138)
I genuinely believe that -500 is a little low for Rogue against Excel. It is very difficult to see a world in which Excel gets an advantage on Rogue. Excel’s preferred playstyle is to concede everything in the early game and hope and pray they make it to the lategame relatively unscathed. Rogue’s preferred playstyle is to build early game advantages through objective takes so that when they fight in the mid-late game they are undeniably stronger than their opponents. It is a match made in hell for Excel. I genuinely believe I would set this line at Rouge -650.
SK, while not impressive last week, will want to get right before going into the playoffs unexpectedly and are significantly better than Astralis. Astralis, on this patch, has a -16.6% GSPD, that would make them the worst team anywhere. Zanzarah just has not been up to LEC snuff so far despite giving the best post game interviews in the World. SK’s strength is Tynx. He should easily overwhelm Zanzarah in this game and SK should cruise to victory. Occasionally, in the LEC, teams will take the last week less seriously than the rest of the split if playoffs are wrapped, I don’t expect that with either of these teams.
LCS
TSM ML (-135) vs. EG 2u
Evil Geniuses’ problems are the same problems they’ve had since they entered the LCS. They have new players, new coaches, new blah, blah, blah, but the team still plays like they have voice chat turned off. It is kind of maddening. They are unbelievably talented. In fact, before the season I thought they were more talented than TSM, but no amount of talent can overcome the in-game decision making of this team. TSM are the exact opposite. They have become the steady-eddies of the LCS under Bjergsen’s leadership. TSM is playing standard, front to back compositions and counting on POE to carry them in the late game. It’s given them a very nice +5% GSPD in the regular season. I have this as TSM at -190, and would bet it up to that number.
CLG Over 10.5 Kills (-127) vs. Evil Geniuses 1u
I already went over Evil Geniuses problems and I think they could easily lose this game, but the kill number for CLG is particularly appealing to me because they could get to this number in a loss too. EG averages 10.75 deaths per win which makes them the second highest team in the league in that number. CLG averages 11 Kills per loss making them the highest team in the league in that number. It points to the teams’ style. They both love to scrap and will try to fight their way out of a corner or out of a win. I expect this to be an extremely bloody game and like CLG to get close to 11 kills in a win or loss. If they win, it’s a near guarantee this goes over. If they lose, it probably goes over around half the time. I would take this up to -200.
Flyquest Over 1.5 Inhibitors vs. GGS (+164) 1u
I do think that Flyquest’s Moneyline is also valuable here and is the safer bet, but I think there’s a couple reasons to like this inhibs bet. First, Flyquest is way better than Golden Guardians. I would take every player on Flyquest before I took one player from Golden Guardians. Sometimes, the difference between the bottom of the table gets lost, but to me the difference between GGS and FLY is as large as the difference between FLY and C9. That’s the case for the Flyquest ML. For the inhibitors, I just don’t see this game ending cleanly with one inhibitor for Flyquest. It is a late season game and Golden Guardians will be throwing it against the wall. Flyquest also struggles in late game shotcalling and will probably play it safe with multiple inhibitors. It’s a bit of a gut-feeling handicap, but +164 is good enough for me to take the shot here.
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