RADIO
What a wild and wooly day out on the rift. FPX rocked out a 22-minute game, and IG delivered a 30 kill experience. High priced mid laners took it on the chin as explosive adc performances took center stage. We'll have some more stud adcs on today's slate to turn everything on its head.
This slate looks familiar, with three big favs and one close matchup its similar to yesterday. Hopefully, we don't see as many shenanigans out of these LCK teams today, and everything goes according to plan. Let's check out that close match first and then work our way through the "easy" ones.
I'll provide my League of Legends advice, analysis, and picks, for this LPL & LCK slate on DraftKings and FanDuel that locks at 3:00 AM on Thursday, January 28th, 2021. Make sure you follow me on Twitter @Mr_Malmanger as I often post starting lineups when I see them and other useful info for the slate.
LCK Matches
3:00 AM DRX (-115) vs. KT Rolster (-115)
DRX is coming into this matchup, winning their last two series by a score of 2-1 over both Sandbox and Nongshim RedForce. They have shown that they are a very young team, always starting the game very slowly but finishing it strong. They have some kinks to work out, but I have high hopes for them throughout 2021. KT, on the other hand, is coming off a reverse sweep vs. T1. While KT did come away with a big victory, it is hard to say it was impressive. T1, especially Gumayusi, had one of their most sloppy series of the split thus far. KT had a lot of exploitable and greedy plays that T1 unfortunately couldn't capitalize on. Will DRX be able to?
I think they are a team that could exploit KT because I feel T1 should have as well. But like I said yesterday, the LCK has been every bit as unpredictable as the LPL this split. When we compare the two teams side by side, we see that KT is a team that prioritizes an early game gold lead based on their better G@15, FT% and HLD%. They try to use this early lead to push vision control and snowball to victory. DRX, on the flip side, look to prioritize first dragons and scale into the mid-late game.
KT will look to play through their playmakers in Blank and Ucal, and if all else fails, they have Hybrid to try to pick up all the pieces. DRX will play through Pyosik, who is the leader and heartbeat of this squad. Both sides make excellent cases, and vegas tends to agree. I'm out of sync with KT, and I'm not very happy about it. I was on them when they threw versus HLE and off when they upset T1, so I'm going to try to reset the system by staying off today and seeing where that gets me. I'll take DRX by a nose here.
Top DRX Plays
- Pyosik - JNG - Perfect Meta for him to thrive in.
- BAO - ADC - 1st in KS% and 2nd in KP%.
- Becca - SUP - 1st in KP% and love to pair with BAO
Top KT Plays
- Blank - JNG - Comes with some sub risk, but the team has been more successful with him than without.
- Ucal - MID - 3rd in the LCK in KS% for MIDs
- Hybrid - ADC - Has 40 kills in 10 games this split, ties him with Ruler and Deokdam.
6:00 AM T1 (-450) vs. Liiv SBG (+290)
I believe I mentioned this last time, but why not reiterate it? Sandbox is one team that will be very hard to predict. They have bright spots in Fate, Croco, and Route, but Liiv still thinks he is the worst of the 2 ADCs they have on their roster. Liiv SBG should remain one of those teams you mark off as Mr. Inconsistent, and I say this because they are a team that seems to understand how to play the game for the 1st half of it, generating the 2nd best gold lead at 15 minutes in the LCK but then don't know what to do with it. Funny enough, I think they are Afreeca 2.0. Afreeca very similar because it usually doesn't know how to close out games with leads they seem to generate quickly.
T1, on the other hand, is way too talented to let Liiv SBG play around and hope they find a way to close out the game. T1 realistically could have two teams in the LCK, and you would be content with saying that they could compete at a very high level. I also think T1 bounces back after a tough loss vs. KT where they did not look like themselves. T1, in my opinion, has team diff across the board. Fun fact: T1 swept all 4 of their matchups vs. Liiv SBG last year.
With Vegas having T1 as a considerable favorite and being an industry favorite, T1 naturally should have high ownership. And it is hard not to agree because it looks like one of the safer matchups to call on paper.
Top T1 Plays
- Gumayushi - ADC - Leads the LCK in all positions with a 45% Kill share rate.
- Keria - SUP - 2nd on the team in KP% and primary beneficiary of Gumayushi's success
- Canna - TOP - Matches up vs. Summit, who leads the LCK in Team Death %.
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LPL Matches
4:00 AM LGD (+240) vs. BLG (-345)
Kramer's return was painful to watch because TES mopped the floor with him and the rest of the LGD squad. LGD has not looked great this split, and a large portion of that has to be because Kramer did miss some time, but he is one player and can only do so much. Their team stats are skewed because they did have Garvey (their backup top laner) play multiple games as their starting ADC.
In my honest opinion, I can't see how Kramer would have changed much of the outcomes that have already happened. LGD will remain a bottom tier team as they rank in the bottom half in many major categories. Cult and Kui are both currently having tough transitions from the LDL to the main stage, and Uniboy has yet to be as successful as he was with AHQ in the PCS.
When it comes to BLG, I think their roster is much better than it once was, but I still think it will take time before it hits its peak. I believe this BLG team does have some sneaky upside to it, and we saw a glimpse of what they could do at full capacity vs. RA last week. Aiming slowly but surely will fully assimilate to the LPL style, and once that happens, we will see the true BLG.
For right now, though, BLG is a team that is far from great, but I find it hard to believe that this roster doesn't find a way to defeat LGD. My friend is also a massive believer in Meteor and his carry potential, so I am doubling down on BLG to win today.
Top BLG plays
- Meteor - JNG - 2nd on the team in KS% and on most slates is captain viable.
- Aiming - ADC - Leads the team in Kills and should match up vs. Kramer/Chance, who combined for an average of 8 deaths per game.
- Zeka - MID - Out of all starting Mids, Zeka ranks 4th in KP.
6:00 AM SN (-600) vs. OMG (+365)
In some way, this feels similar to the LGD/BLG matchup where one team belongs to stay in the bottom tier, and another could grow out of it. As you may have guessed, yes, Suning is the team that I believe could grow out of it. No expert is needed to claim the Worlds runner up is better than their record reflects.
These shortcomings could have to do with the fact that SN did lose a huge piece in SwordArt, who occupied the primary shotcalling role for this team, and we have seen early on in the split some communication breakdowns. Besides Huanfeng, who has looked fine even in losses, the rest of SN sometimes look like they are on completely separate pages. SN's -1479 GD15 ranks for 3rd worst in the LPL behind both TT and RW. Based on an eye test, you can see that without SwordArt, SN has looked very indecisive early on in games, and unfortunately, that has led to their opponents running away with games. Luckily for SN, they get to face off vs. OMG.
On the other hand, OMG is one of those teams that skate by in the early game but look lost in the mid to late game. Their top lane situation is a big reason for that. They are currently trying to get Bright acclimated to the top lane since he used to be their back up mid laner as New had provided no help for the team when he started.
It wouldn't shock me if OMG were to steal a game today, like they have done previously to Estar and EDG, but this is SN's series to lose. SN's roster is just way too good, even without SwordArt, to fall to bottom-tier teams like OMG.
Top SN plays
- Huanfeng - ADC - Leads the team in KP% and KS% by a large margin.
- Bin - TOP - 2nd on the team in KP% and 3rd in KS%, and gets a matchup vs. a converted MID in Bright.
- Angel - MID - 2nd on the team in KS% and accounts for the least amount of deaths on his team. Less deaths = more time on the map.
Summary
- TLDR: 2-1 DRX, 2-0 T1, 2-0 BLG, 2-1 SN. It seems pretty straightforward outside the DRX/KT matchup, but we know how unpredictable League of Legends is. No win is guaranteed.
- It will be tough to pass up on T1 today, coming off a big disappointment in their matchup vs. KT. We have yet to see Gumayushi mad, so it will be something to watch.
- OMG and LGD will both be unowned on this slate, and if you are playing a large field, I don't mind taking a shot at sub 10% ownership, but I would limit to small stacks only.
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