East Division Hello, it’s Toxin! I’m officially in South Korea now, so if anyone is interested in stories about the Korean server, personal stories about my quarantine experiences, etc. just let me know in my DMs and I’ll be happy to share! Anyways, back to the regularly scheduled content: BOL Power Rankings! Last week in the East went almost exactly the way I had predicted it with four 2-0 victories. The only difference was that Singed’s Crab Shack rebounded with a win over Limitless Excel, which I saw going the other way. Let’s get into the rankings!
1. GSG Sigma (+1)
First place this week is GSG Sigma, who have cemented themselves on top of this division. The one thing I will say about this team is that despite significantly putting themselves before the game started with their drafts, they still were able to convincingly take down the Literal Monkeys this week. They broke out a new OP pick on stream, that being the Amumu support pick. Although I personally think that this pick doesn’t seem like it should be that insane to play against, the current record of the champ in BOL last week was 5-0 in game score with only one of those games being in the jungle. In addition, they also broke out Senna mid, a pick that I’ve only seen work in IBS. Maybe GSG Sigma is insane and is inventing a new meta. Maybe they are insane mentally and they are just getting away with it because they were against the Literal Monkeys. Either way, I expect this team to continue their winning ways for the rest of the regular season. Player to Watch: Vandrahl The main reason that this team was able to win game two last week was due to Vandrahl’s Ekko pick. The game just reached a point where Ekko hit his power spike and suddenly the Monkeys just started getting mind controlled into being deleted over and over by Vandrahl. It was quite spectacular to watch, definitely worth checking the vod on the Blueotterleage Twitch Channel if you get the chance. It’s clear that Vandrahl is the voice of reason in the GSG Sigma comms, and he is definitely a contender for, if not the best jungler in the league.
2. Radiant Storm Onslaught (+1)
Moving up again is Radiant Storm Onslaught, which now find themselves in second place. Last week they made quick work of NSG Gold, in two games that seemed very one sided from initially looking at it. There’s three main things to note about this team; the first of which being that they finally had their starting support, Charanko, playing this week. Both he and his duo in the bot lane, Moekaizer, looked phenomenal against NSG strongest players, so I’m confident that this can be one of the best bot lanes in this division. Speaking of roster moves though, they just picked up Basting the 2nd from Monkeys Rising to be their starting top laner. This is a puzzling move to me, considering how well CoffeeTurtle was doing the last three weeks. Finally, I want to note that this team’s two wins, despite being dominant, have been against bottom teams in this division. I’m interested to see how they will do against Limitless Excel and Singed’s Crab Shack, the latter of which they play this week on stream. This is definitely a match to watch closely to see how this division shakes out.
Player to Watch: Basting the 2nd
I think that the player I have my eyes on this week has gotta be the new addition in the top lane. A lot of things around this move are very confusing to me, so I really want to see how Basting the 2nd fits in with a team outside of the Literal Monkeys organization. Will he thrive in a new environment and break out some more split push champions that he enjoys playing in normals, or will he falter being away from his teammates that he spent an entire year on a team with?
3. Singed’s Crab Shack (+1)
Next up is Singed’s Crab Shack, who took down Limitless Excel and earned the right to climb back up the standings after a shaky week the week before. Honestly though, I’m a prophet. Star player and the player to watch really stepped up last week and really carried his team to victory! Jokes aside, this team took me forgetting to give them a player to watch to heart and made sure to put up a performance that I couldn’t ignore. I think that they took their week two performance as a wake-up call and put in extra work during the week to clean up their teamwork as a team. This is definitely a team to watch out for because I feel like they aren’t even scratching the surface of their potential yet. Player to Watch: Killgar and VIN0 Since I didn’t do a Player to Watch for the Crab Shack last week, I’m going to give them two this week. Game one was the VIN0 show, where it seems like he kinda just had a field day stealing Mundo’s stats and bonking the enemy team into the dust. In game two, I think Killgar saw what Limitless picked in game one and decided to steal it away for himself. This pick, Ziggs Adc, ended up being paired with Amumu Support and created a bot lane that seemed impossible to deal with. I think this combination actually synergizes quite well with each other, and I can see this being a strong pick for the upcoming weeks.
4. Limitless Excel (-3)
Falling three places this week is Limitless Excel, which feels like a market correction to me. I think I may have had them placed too high up on the list originally, so this seems like the more likely spot for them right now. Here’s the thing, I think that this team has the tools to break into the top three, but they have a lot to work on individually before they can get to that level. Afen and C0nquers definitely struggled this week, and I don’t think the rest of their team looked particularly well despite being on strong comfort picks. Unless there was a huge fight in the voice call that I don’t know about, I think individually this team just needs to play more in order to break into the next tier. They have the skill to get there, they just gotta put in the time.
Player to Watch: Afen I think Afen dropped the ball pretty hard last week with his performance. He decided to first time Jarvan IV in game one of the series, and while the champion is not the hardest to pilot, you do need to play the champion at least a little bit to get used to him. In Game two, he decided to play Kindred, where he had the highest gold share on his team but was unable to do anything with this gold. As a player who is also transitioning to Jungle from a different role, I really want to see Afen spam more jungle games in between weeks and really get used to the role. I want to see him take this new role seriously and try to improve. I don’t think we’ve seen the peak of this player yet, and I want to see how high his ceiling is. But if he decides to keep blowing off playing the role, the success of his team will fall dramatically.
5. NSG Gold (=)
Staying in 5th place is NSG Gold despite another rough loss last week. There’s good news and bad news when looking at this roster heading into Week Four. The good news is that they have finally started looking into players to fill in for their solo lanes, as they added two players that look to be top laners to their roster. These two players should be able to inspire a healthy competition within this team that will allow them all of their top lane players to improve. The bad news is that CRØNA decided to leave the roster after last week’s loss, so I have no idea who their support will be moving forward. My best guess? I think that NateGG slides to support, BarbaricChampion slides to ADC, and RENDEŁMAN is given a chance to play Mid Lane. Player to Watch: Everyone With CRØNA off the roster and no clear replacement named, I want to see what this team can do when going up against the current best team in the division GSG Sigma. I think that someone really needs to step on this team and prove that this team can be a playoff team, otherwise this team will not stay in 5th place in my rankings for much longer.
6. Big Duck Entourage (+1)
Moving up one spot this week is Big Duck Entourage, who are steadily climbing into a playoff spot as the weeks go by. The main issue with this team right now is the fact that they randomly decided to drop their entire roster after this victory. After the dust settled, only JayJ and Para04 remain on the starting roster, with Allfire26, Tumble OP, and Ateta being moved to subs. In their place is the return of S10 Survivor, this time in the adc role (now the second former CB top laner swapping to ADC), Łotuss in the mid lane (who you might remember from VBU Plutonium last split), and Alumyn in the support role (a name that seems familiar but I’m not sure from where). The latter of those moves is going to count as an esub for them this week when they go up against Limitless Excel. This blow up does not give me much confidence in this roster moving forward. This is now the second or third complete roster blow up that has involved JayJ on the roster, and I think that if you’ve been to enough crime scenes, you eventually become a suspect. Overall I don’t think the team got any better or worse, but I also completely expect the roster to look different come Week 5.
Player to Watch: Para04
As the only member not named JayJ that remains on the roster after the changes, my eyes are on Para04 to see how long this player’s halflife is. Will he stick it out until the end and whip this team into shape? I think it's very possible, and realistically this team can be a wild card team come playoffs. Para04’s Mordekaiser popped off last week, and I think his ceiling is quite high if he can stay on the roster long enough to reach it.
7. Revolution Gold (+1)
Moving up one spot this week is Revolution Gold, and it’s not due to anything this team has done. Between this team and the last place team, personally I think this team deserves the seventh place spot due to the mentality and expectations of this roster. Revolution Gold came into this league knowing that they are a development roster, which allows this team to have a clear identity throughout the split. They are here to soak up all of the knowledge that they can, keep a positive attitude, and use that knowledge to improve as players so that they come out on top in the next split. We have seen teams like the Crimson Dolphins follow this strategy in S4, and they exploded onto the scene last split in S5. This persona of the team makes me confident that they will continue to improve throughout the season and may just squeak out a win at some point.
Player to Watch: That1potatogirl I think the biggest question mark I have on this roster is That1potatogirl. This week, she picked her most played champion, Darius, in a 50-50 matchup against Para04’s Mordekaiser and lost both badly. While she did improve from game one to game two, I think that you really need to expect more out of this player as a Revolution fan. I think that if she can start going even in lane rather than losing lane, the team’s chances of winning will increase dramatically. Perhaps a champion pool change may help?
8. Literal Monkeys (-2)
Plummeting to last place this week is the Literal Monkeys, which at this point are living in a nightmare. If you look at the roster that this team put out in Week Two, this team has no business being anywhere near the bottom of the division. That roster should be a lock for a playoff spot and yet this team is 0-3. On top of that, this team is also going through a different roster every week; this week they had Hide in Shrouds swap back to support, JasonKBoy23 filling in mid lane, and Muddey playing ADC. Can this team make the playoffs? Yes, they have the talent to recover from this terrible start and finish out the season 4-4. But is this team mentally boomed without out any leadership to right the ship? I think that is a very likely possibility at this point, considering the circumstances.
Player to Watch: JasonKBoy24
The player I want to point out this week is JasonKBoy24. Despite role swapping from Top lane to Mid lane and going up against one of the best mid laners in the league, I thought he played decently well in his BOL deput. Did he kinda just afk farm and not die? Absolutely. Could he have done more damage and helped carry his team more. Of course. But he wasn’t actively an anchor to this team, and for the Literal Monkeys that can only be seen as a positive at this point in time. We’ll see if he plays this week, or if yet another mid laner will be seen.
My Predictions for this week:
Literal Monkeys 2-1 Revolution Gold
GSG Sigma 2-0 NSG Gold
Limitless Excel 2-1 Big Duck Entourage
Radiant Storm Onslaught 2-1 Singed’s Crab Shack
Imperial Gaming 2-0 Nails and Day Spa
CB X 2-1 Monkeys Rising
Nitwits in Purgatory 2-0 Krakens of Love
Conduit Esports 2-1 Reign Gaming
East All Star team of the Week:
Top Lane: Physıcal Jungle: Vandrahl
Mid Lane: Dark Evil Natsu
AD Carry: Killgar Support: Charanko
West Division Sup, It's Wakka! Back again for this week's rankings for BOL Gold Season 6. Last week we saw a lot of shake up the west with certain teams maintaining the hot streak and some others dropping behind with a really hard time to catch up. I'd really like to say that the West division is starting to round out who's gonna be at the top and who's having trouble sitting at the bottom. Is it possible that the top 4 for this division are already set in place? Time to take a little deeper dive into last week's matchups and this week's matchups to see how all our favorite teams are sitting this week.
West Division
1. Conduit Esports (+1)
Sitting in at the number one spot this week for the west division is Conduit Esports. As they are A. looking great for the most part and B. the only team left in the West that is undefeated, series wise. Yes this team has dropped some games to maybe even questionable teams like Monkeys Rising and the biggest shocker was last weeks lost to Krakens of Love who *spoiler* are rated the worst team in the West. Coulda just been a flook good teams drop games once in a while I get it but I feel like it should never be from the worst team in the division. I'm still truly a Conduit believer. JJH and company have been playing well and the team is performing when it needs to and should do so again as they play a struggling Reign Gaming.
Player to Watch: ayngenetics
Ayngenetics is this week's player to watch for the series because last week when he played extremely well, with a great carry game 1 from JJH too, they won and when he struggled in game 2 they lost to Krakens granted it also looks like the rest of the team trolled and inted the game away as their top lane was 13/3 and adc was 9/0. So a good key indicator how Conduit is gonna play during the game is if ayngenetics is playing well or not it really reflects on the team
2. Imperial Gaming (+2)
I knew it, I knew it, that when BOL Plat Season 1 Champion ParadigmShift was added to the roster this team would get drastically better and it really showed as this last week they stomped and put on a clinic vs CBX last week. Ok so it really wasn't just BOL Plat Season 1 Champion ParadigmShift 1v9’ing as much as i'd like to think that, everyone else on Imperial showed up and popped off, Actual Bird played amazing in both games against what some would say the best top laner in BOL gold this season and even last season. Great week by imperial lets hope it continues as they play the struggling Nails and Day Spa this week.
Player to Watch: Actual Bird
This week Actual Bird has another top tier top laner to go against as Diete is Season 4 Gold Champion and was the original carry for Nads back in the day. But I'd say that Actual Bird has already proven themselves to be a top tier Top laner as well, beating Diete will just be another notch in the belt of top laners smashed by Actual Bird.
3. CBX (-2)
Took the hard L in week 3 vs a new and improved Imperial squad who is definitely stronger than they were in weeks past. I'm willing to give CBX a “break” on the week as It could've just been a down week for the players and everyone could just be off of their games. Could have been distracted with other things in the week prior that could have led to limited practice or anything, so yes I still think CBX is a great team and really should continue to have dominance in this division taking a top spot. But if they drop more games or lose more series I might have to start doubting them and looking for a solution to their issues.
Player to watch: Altazi
Altazi was made a fool in last week's match up plain and simple, he needs to bring it back together if this team is to be successful. He cant be given a counter pick and not do well on it like in game 2 of last week's matchup. Yes game one he was counted as he had to blind lillia top. Altazi is probably one of if not the best top laners in the league and he needs to show it if CBX wants to not have him start defaulting to generic gold picks like Ornn or Morde or Shen.
4. Monkeys Rising (+1)
Monkeys Rising has well been rising in my eyes. As they are actually the sole holders of 2nd place in the west division with 15 points mainly because even in their one series lost they were able to take a game off of Conduit, the top team in West, I do think they have had an easy road and weak schedule so far apart from the Conduit series. They can move up even more in my mind if they are able to take a game off of CBX or even the series then Monkeys Rising is 100% a contender for a top slot in the west division.
Player to watch: Vxpir
Has a rough matchup this week going against Altazi. But we saw last week that if Altazi is struggling there is a chance that the rest of the team might struggle as well. I've got faith in the rest of Monkeys Rising, especially BuriedDonut and Chinese Spy. I really believe they will be able to hold their ground so it's up to Top and Jungle to find ways to gap CBX and try to take games off of them.
5. Reign Gaming (+1)
It's still really hard for me to find much to say about Reign as they haven't really shown much and it will be like that for awhile until they start beating teams or taking off games from other teams because they are only really this high because they have beaten one of teams below them and still have a FF. This would be a big week for Reign to take a series to finally push them upwards and maybe still fight for a playoff spot
Player to Watch: Emperor
If Reign wants to win this week they need Emperor to be very proactive and very in their faces. They need to help out everylane as best as possible while still being around objectives and such, so yes regular jungle things, but they need to do it exceptionally well this week if they want to take games off of top dog Conduit Esports.
6. Nitwits in Purgatory (+1)
Turned things around this week taking down a team I thought would have been a lot better and could have possibly been fighting for a top spot right with CBX and Conduit but NIP shut that down. NIP could have some great tempo going into the midseason tournament as they face Krakens of Love this week to add to their point totals. Some great plays were made from the jungler this week Abound gapping Kizer all of last week needing more weeks like that from them and this team will be fighting for a playoff spot. Also great job on the Bot Lane and Midlanes part on doing what they needed to do, I don't know if they read the rankings and did what i said they needed to do to win but it seemed to work out the way i said they would need to beat nads.
Player to watch: Abound
MVP of last week's series, the games they won were the games this player popped off and put the team on his back. Also had some great support mid picks from Eastonn8 this last week just helping out their team as much as possible, really great week from everyone but if the success wants to continue abound need to keep gapping kids in this league
7. Nails and Day Spa (-4)
Taking our largest leap down in the rankings this week is Nails and Day Spa. This team has been looking super shaking almost every single week. Like we can agree that week 1 is rough vs CBX and then week 2 they play Krakens, the lowest team in the division and then we thought they were playing another team towards the bottom and lost to them. I'm not really sure what is going on with NADs. Whether it is tilt coming from top lane or tilt coming from bot lane or tilt coming from everywhere it needs to be figured out and stopped if this team has 3 of the 5 players of the Season 4 Championship team of NADS. If they are able to win their series vs Imperial this week I can easily see this team shooting back up in the rankings but they need to win and prove that then.
Player to Watch: Diete
Diete needs to take over the carry role no matter what he was a huge reason for the team's past success. Like yes we get it's been 2 seasons but you gotta think that they should still have it. Maybe they just need to find their niche again like the Zilean Hecarim Aatrox comps or the right Swain carry bot comps something though and it needs to start with Diete.
8. Krakens of Love (=)
I honestly think Krakens could of had a chance of moving up if some of the other matchups went a different way but certains lost and won that made it impossible for us to justify moving Krakens up even tho they did take a game off of Conduit the top team in the west which in my book is some major points. I think this is Krakens biggest week yet to finally move themselves out of 8 and move upwards. As they have to play NIP which is a team slightly ahead of them but definitely not punching too far upward and I think if kraken is able to play like they did in the win vs Conduit they can easily 2-0 NIP this week and start moving in the right direction.
Player to Watch: Chrizzleblizzle and XFX
These 2 players showed last week that they are most likely the strongest players on the roster and they need to show up if they want the team's success to continue. The win against Conduit Chrizzleblizzle popped the f’ off on the Sett and XFX played the Ezreal the way it needs to be played kiting poke monster and they 2v8 the game vs conduit. Need more carry games out of those two and maybe even a strong performance out of TheForgottenOne mid too would help the team out
Wakkas Predictions for this week:
Literal Monkeys 2-0 Revolution Gold
GSG Sigma 2-0 NSG Gold
Limitless Excel 2-1 Big Duck Entourage
Radiant Storm Onslaught 2-0 Singed’s Crab Shack
Imperial Gaming 2-0 Nails and Day Spa
CB X 2-0 Monkeys Rising
Nitwits in Purgatory 2-0 Krakens of Love
Conduit Esports 2-1 Reign Gaming
Wakka Predictions Season Record
(13-3)
West All Star team of the Week:
Top Lane: Actual Bird Jungle: Abound
Mid Lane: JJH
AD Carry: BuriedDonut Support: Ypsi
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