Hey everyone, it’s Toxin! One the most requested things people ask for in our community is player rankings. Before I get into the actual rankings, I just want to go over some of the criteria that I used when making these rankings. First, I did not look at the actual stats that you could find in the stats-bot channel of the Discord. Not only is the bot bugged at times, but I personally believe that looking purely at stats does not accurately depict a person’s skill level relative to everyone else in the league. I also will not be using any scrim results to factor in where a player falls in regards to everyone else. Not only do I not have every single team’s scrim records available to me, but I also know that scrims are not always approached with the intent to win. Players use scrims to practice new picks and play more with their teammates, which does not always mean they are 100% trying to win. On top of that, some teams don’t scrim at all.
The main things I will be looking at when making the player rankings is your head to head matchups against others in your division, as well as any past knowledge I may have on you as a player. The players themselves are grouped together into a tier list. While I have them listed in my own particular order, I think that players within their tiers can be interchangeable. For example, any player listed in S tier can be argued for the best player in the role. Finally, I will only be looking at active starting players. For some players, this could hurt your ranking due to a) you not currently being on a team, or b) you not being a starter but doing well when you filled in. Only one player will be allowed from each team. Let’s get into the rankings!
Mid Lane:
Okay for Mid Lane specifically, I’m just gonna come right out and say that the difference between a lot of these players is really small. Like there’s virtually no separation between S tier and B tier they way there is in every other role. I think if you were to argue for some players to move up or down a tier, I would probably agree with you. The biggest reason that Mid laners are so hard to rank is that no teams really play through their mid laners that well. The main teams that I see that play through mid are at the bottom of their respective divisions, but in these cases they do end up looking better than the players that are beating them. A good example is Tethnos on NSG Amethyst. His team hasn’t won a series, but he himself has played well. How do you compare him to someone like JJH, who doesn’t have to do anything significant and still wins due to Snowlife existing? Or to any player in the North, which seems to flip a coin to decide whether or not they want to play well on a given day? For this reason, I’m just gonna go with my gut where I feel players stand at this point in time. There’s definitely a ton of room for these rankings to change before the next rankings!
S tier:
Kaïten (VBU Argon)
JJH (CB Obsidian)
Currently, I would say that these two players are the ones I would say belong in the S tier right now. That being said, I think there’s plenty of room for others to join them. I can also completely understand arguments to move each of them down. With Kaïten, he has been dominant in his games, but all of his competition is currently ranked in the B tier or worse. For JJH, I would say he doesn't do anything wrong in his games, but it's not like anything that he does really stands out very much, as it’s mainly the Snowlife show for CB Obsidian. That being said, I think these two players are still my pick for the top players in their role, despite how small the gap is between them and the players in the A tier.
A tier:
SayJoe (Collective Cosmic)
TheFireOfTheFox1 (Limitless Chaos)
BuhRock (CB Rangers)
ClassyNatsu (Oasis NADS)
BTG (CB Royal)
ExStarZ (Crimson)
Azurexfire (Imperial Gaming)
Raztastic (Gob Squad)
Karma Divine (NSG Infinity)
Drakana (Dead Orbit)
Lone Wind (Mad Rawrs)
Okay, now it’s time to go over why all these good players aren’t in S tier. For some of them, I think that consistency is a major reason why these players are stuck in A tier. This mainly applies to all of the North mid laners, which all have games where they look absolutely smurf, and then games where they randomly forget how to play / get camped and run it. This also applies to the West mid laners, as I think SayJoe is the closest to joining the S tier, but his loss to Cobber is a major reason keeping him here. For the South mid laners, I think the biggest thing keeping them here is their lack of games. Due to the major roster switch ups in the South, I can’t really say I’ve seen enough out of Lone Wind, Drakana, or BTG to warrant moving them into the S tier, but from the eye test I can tell that they are probably in the A tier. As a result, I can’t really say too much about ExStarZ or Karma Divine, as they haven’t really haven’t played enough against stronger competition to say that they belong in the S tier, but I think they definitely should be in A tier somewhere.
B tier:
Tethnos (NSG Amethyst)
Eastonn8 (Final Esports)
Smittyeh (Twin Spirits)
Ball Slap (Literal Monkeys)
Wise324 (Shrimp Fried Rice)
Łotuss (VBU Plutonium)
Cobber (Silverline)
Silver Rookie (Classic Esports)
A Clogged Toilet (Mythos Purple)
Next, we head over to the B tier. I think that these players can all contend with those in the A tier, but haven’t gotten positive results as consistently. For example, Tethnos and Silver Rookie are examples of players that seem to be performing well on the outside, but were unable to lead their team to win throughout the first round robin. Other players, such as Eastonn8, Smittyeh, and Ball Slap, are players that are not the win con on their teams, but are exploited more than some of the similar players I have in the S and A tiers. The final player I want to highlight is Wise324, who has played less games than his sub at this point. I think that he has the potential to move up, but I haven’t seen enough to move him any higher.
C tier:
1hand (NSG Gold)
BBANDB (KQC)
We end off with the final two mid laners, 1hand and BBANDB, in the C tier. For the former, I think that this player was very clearly the weakest link on his team, and his play against opposition that I already have mainly in the B tier was poor. For the latter, I think the switch to Mid lane was detrimental to his tier ranking, as I thought that his play in the top lane was actually not half bad. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said about the limited amount of games that he’s played in mid lane.
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