I remember that week after QF and just before SF. That was the first time in a long while that no one for sure knows who’s going to win. There were no overwhelming favorites and every team was on the same tier.
Honestly a lot of people had the same feeling for every team in playoffs outside of splyce; fnatic, damwon and griffin were all possible contenders. I remember never being more hyped prior to a worlds playoffs than that year, really felt like anyone could take it.
DWG was a good team, but they still had the Nuclear problem and the Don't Wanna Go mindset. I don't think anyone considered them contenders, especially since they would have to face SKT next.
Wrong every1 was saying skt will destroy g2
Even wen g2 pounded em ina second bo5 dst year, won 3-1 ppl were saying " skt lost 3-1 but dey played better cuz dey got more barons. "
Groups C and D were also ridiculously stacked with the RNG-SKT-FNC and IG-DWG-TL groups, though that took a lot of the excitement out of groups A and B.
Yup then Doublelift defended him publicly into Jensen not defending Doublelift's short slump/lack of motivation from having no jungler and MSI being cancelled.
Also xmithie got swapped out for a more 'mechanical' jungler for a better mid/jg duo when Jensen made that game absolutely unplayable for xmithie.
Splyce could have been in the same group as TL instead of Damwon.
Group D: Team Liquid, AHQ, Invictus Gaming & Splyce.
Group C: Funplus Phoenix, Gigabyte Marines, J-Team & Damwon.
Griffin tied g2 with a 5-1 so honestly they stomped the group as much as g2 did. They might have gotten mismatched against ig of all teams (even if they lose the other matchups too) because theshy was going all out again in 2019 which made sword (arguably the weakest eliminations toplaner) a one sided affair that most people remembered for the griffin series
I'm not sure about that, if we use the "they lost both games by an inch" logic, then FNC in theory should not have advanced either. The skill levels of GRF and RNG were close enough that it's difficult to tell for certain. This sort of equivalence makes no sense.
I'm not so sure about that, FPX had to play a tiebreaker with SPY (now MAD Lions) to get 1st in group. SPY was good enough to make into knockouts in a harder group, though if TL would have been placed in Group B, they could have a better chance to make it out of the groups.
>TL was probably better than Splyce
Based on what? Everybody seems to be gassing up 2020 TL but outside of the nice opening game vs DWG they struggled to beat aHq twice and that's pretty much their run.
The SKT group was actually stacked
Group D wasn't that strong.. dwg were a 3rd place LCK team and IG were complete boom.. barely scraped into worlds AND switched junglers mid worlds.. and the last team was TL and LCS team (not much more needs to be said)
Rng were def a top 8 team.. and got completely fucked by a terrible system/minor mistakes vs skt x2
Fnc also managed to have 5 game series vs G2 one the top 3 favorites for worlds
Skt from what I remeber was the favorite for the whole thing.. with people saying the effort switch for mata was massive and a difference maker
DWG were a 2nd place regular season LCK team that had the same record as GRF (pretty much Baby Thunder), iG's core was still intact from their championship roster, and TL had managed to take down a 9-1 iG in a BO5.
2019 was probably the holistically strongest worlds we’ve ever seen (strongest LPL, strongest LCS, strongest LEC, arguably one of the strongest LCK w/ GRF, DWG, and SKT superteam), but everyone still thinks FPX is one of the weakest teams to win lol
to be fair LWX was running it down in groups, but was insane in finals iirc. i remember LWX just kaisa ulting solo into enemy team and being one shot multiple times
Lwx had insane summer split, playoffs, semis quarters
finals and ppl still underrate him coz of few bo1 in groups in his first ever international tournament :(
>but everyone still thinks FPX is one of the weakest teams to win lol
I think that stems from the fact they didn't have to play a single Korean team to win the tournament. Not saying I agree with this sentiment, but it sure didn't harm them that they dodged all those Korean teams.
Bruh what are you talking about? They are talking about the series itself not the entire competition. Not every bo5 has the best league you ever see. Some bo5 are higher quality than others at world.
Yep. SKT vs ROX in 2016 semis is still imo the best bo5 in LoL history. Two teams playing at an incredibly high level.
Some years you have insane matchups and other years it’s not as good.
The seemingly random MF as Zyra counter made this series like ten times better than anything else. Everyone was confused, including casters and fucking Faker (!) himself.
Yeah I feel like both semifinals AND the finals going to 5 games signals a level of competition that hasn’t really been seen before. Maybe 2016?
Seriously it felt like 3/4 teams in 2021 had a very, very real chance of winning it all.
For 2019 it felt like we got “counter” matchups where FPX knew they won literally as soon as they saw g2 win.
Yea this post feels weird and out of nowhere considering how good the Semifinals were last year. I guess people still want to disrespect GenG despite them taking EDG to 5 games, but I guess that only matters when a western team like MAD does it.
I don't think it's because GenG or the 2021 semis lineup is worse imo, it's just that the meta in 2021 was defined by being safe and vision control. They're good, sure, but it's not as exciting.
Kinda like a top tier boxing match but half the time they were just cuddling.
I agree, and these teams actually felt like they performed way harder than some of the 2019 teams (IG, SKT). With the exception of DK in the finals it felt like the teams last year were really playing to their limits and it was super fun to watch
To be fair Fudge said in scrims HLE were better than GenG.
FBI also said HLE were the strongest they scrimmed. I still think GenG were better but HLE that worlds should not be overlooked
Yeah I feel like both semifinals AND the finals going to 5 games signals a level of competition that hasn’t really been seen before. Maybe 2016?
Seriously it felt like 3/4 teams in 2021 had a very, very real chance of winning it all.
For 2019 it felt like we got “counter” matchups where FPX knew they won literally as soon as they saw g2 win.
That narrative is just not true. It’s so weird that the casters went on about it and everyone just absorbed the narrative. They consistently lost to Samsung blue throughout the year and was the second Samsung team. They had a good game against Blue and Dade is the infamous international tilter and went on to win, if they had more OGN teams in the tournament I don’t think they could have won.
They were not the best team in the most competitive tournament of OGN 2014. SKT stomped them winter, and Samsung blue stomped them in spring/ summer.
2019 was gigachad year(duh). And as EU enjoyer i also love 2018, 3 western midlaners in semis. Can we make repeat of that, but with slightly different outcome, please?
This is controversial but I will disagree here.
The FPX side of the bracket was much stronger than the G2 side by quite a bit. Looking at how G2 got ran out of the building in finals on top of SKT throwing large leads vs G2 I really don't see how that side isnt seen as a large drop in quality.
We way overrated G2 and SKT from that worlds imo
I still feel G2 just didn't show up on the day of the finals. Both G2 and T1 were playing like virtuosos in their semifinal. T1 picking up the Yasuo Gragas bottomlane was fantastic, and then Caps carrying through the midlane to close out the series. Fantastic play all around. I don't want to take anything away from FPX, they were better on the day.
I don't see the same disparity between the sides of the brackets you do.
G2 performed pretty much the same in semis and finals.
Both series they were falling behind early and often in games but FPX didnt make errors when G2 pressured the map a bit where SKT did.
Like when you compare Gold difference at 10, 15 and 20 the series are almost identical with G2 being down by similar amounts. Difference was FPX was a really good team who shut G2 out with those big leads while SKT threw them away. The same thing happened in the final day for G2 against griffin, they got blown out.
Had a lead all game long?
[https://i.imgur.com/cxNTQYz.jpg](https://i.imgur.com/cxNTQYz.jpg)
Stop trying to gaslight people lol, they had a lead for 10 mins of the game against a GP
Gold was even until about 17 minutes after which G2 literally had a gold lead till the 30 minute mark, what are you talking about. That's most of the game in control.
I heard fpx was doing worse against skt in scrim so maybe it a counter matchup that world. Something like skt < g2 < fpx < skt so fpx just rolled g2 in final as a result.
someone in FPX said they were getting ready to get kicked out of the tournament and go home because they had 20% wr against skt. They didn't understand how skt lost to g2
Yea crazy things happen in competition all the time but some are truly surprising. If you tell me that fpx would go last in groups last year considering that they were one of the favorite, I would have call you crazy lol.
Well, playstyles do have direct counters. G2 couldn't handle Doinb, maybe SKT could have ? And it seemed like it according to scrims. IG would also have blasted G2 if they went to finals. IG and FPX were kinda similar in power level
Well, according to scrims DWG would have obliterated G2 but we all know scrims don't mean anything most of the time so maybe SKT would have lost to FPX too
I think their brackets were probably the most evenly matched tbh.
Fpx had IG and FNC.
G2 had DWG and SKT.
The Fpx vs Ig series ended in a 3-1 but in all honesty should have gone to game 5 which may have ended up in IG winning if it wasnt for some mistakes by Jkl and theshy, kind of same to how skt threw vs g2 in the midgame.
It is also fair to say that DWG was a better team than FNC.
The g2-skt-fpx matchups based on the scrim stories seems like a rock paper scissor thing where when one is take out of the equation there is a clear winner but since it is based on scrims it is difficult to speculate.
My rankings come out of this worlds were this, all based on play we saw in groups but mostly bracket stage.
1. FPX
2. IG
3. Griffin (they clearly figured G2 out in groups when we say week 2 speedrun matches similar to FPX in finals)
4. G2
5. SKT
6. FNC
7. DWG
8. RNG
9. TL
10. Splyce
DWK Lost in a convincing manner to EDG in finals, but holy fuck how epic was T1/DWK ? Insane drafts and gameplay from both sides. Ofc we overreacted as hell and wrote off the otherside of the bracket (WE were proven wrong), that was the best international BO5 since SKT/ROX
I think IG being top 4 is arguable. They were absurdly lucking by drawing Griffin which is a perfect stylistic matchup. TheShy clowned so hard on Sword and it's the only reason IG won that series.
In another draw I think Griffin gets top 4. GRF might've done better than IG against certain teams imo.
They were legit better than all the teams that didn't make top 8 that year at worlds (maybe we could argue DAMWON but Nuclear was trash) and LPL was legit the best region in the worlds that year
So yeah. Safe to say they were one of the 4 best teams in the world..
You realize they placed 3/4th in worlds also, making them the 3/4th ranked team. Being placed 4th in a prior tournament does not mean that’s their ceiling lol
DWG got ass blasted by G2, RNG wasn't clutch enough when it mattered and FNC outplayed themselves into mentalbooming against FPX. No one of them went out in a "man what if they won hère" manner
Then who was outside of maybe DAMWON was a top 4 team in the world
Griffin got dicked by IG
Fnatic and splyce also got shafted hard in QFs so they're out of the question.
Seeding doesn't mean anything. It's not always indicative of skill. C9 was the 3rd seed at 2016 worlds under CLG but everyone agreed C9 was the better team. Origen was 3rd seed under H2K at 2015 worlds too.
RNG was 2nd seed but couldn't even manage to win a group with Fnatic.
>Then who was outside of maybe DAMWON was a top 4 team in the world
RNG and FNC were FAR better, DWG was better.. heck even SPY played better vs SKT than IG did vs GRF, that was one of the lowest skillwise series i've ever seen at worlds.
>Griffin got dicked by IG Fnatic and splyce also got shafted hard in QFs so they're out of the question.
Excuse me what? How the fuck does losing to a different (and far stronger) team make them weaker than IG?????????
>Seeding doesn't mean anything. It's not always indicative of skill. C9 was the 3rd seed at 2016 worlds under CLG but everyone agreed C9 was the better team. Origen was 3rd seed under H2K at 2015 worlds too.
I completely agree with you, seeding doesn't mean anything, a proof of that could be the fact that IG ,despite being the 4 th best team of the LPL, was seeded 3rd.
>RNG was 2nd seed but couldn't even manage to win a group with Fnatic.
As if Fnatic was a weak team???????
2021 semis were the most stacked by far, everyone was a title contender and even T1 surprised everyone by also playing like a title contender
In 2019 IG were world champions but they had an incredibly bad year, G2 really only seemed good because LCK was still weak and well, T1 was the only not weak team in LCK. In any case, replay those semis 100 times and FPX wins 98 times, replay 2021 100 times and each team gets at least 10 titles.
which part did I get wrong?
was FPX way above everyone else? yes they were, clearly evidenced by not only results but also everything prior to them
was IG struggling? yes they were, they got to semis but their opponents were imploding griffin, a good team but an empty shell of their former selves
was G2 strong? kinda, definitely stronger than T1 but *still* nowhere FPX and it was clear as hell. you *could* hold their groups against them (can't even beat exploding griffin), but it's just bo1s so it's not really fair. a good team, not even close to any of 4 teams in 2021
was T1 strong? they weren't bad I guess, but if you're so much weaker than G2, you're just there to get beaten up
A year with three teams that are there to get beaten up, with T1 being clearly weaker than the other three is nowhere near 2021
Let's ignore some facts and put ourselves into gigantic hopium of EU fan who believed that G2 is FPX level. Is 2019 as stacked as 2021? Still not even close, it's *still* just two teams, compared to 2021 which had 3 roughly equal strength teams (Damwon, EDG, RNG) and two more teams that surprised everyone by also playing at their level (T1 and GenG). Out of 5 roughly equal strength *worlds title contenders*, 4 of them went to semis (which you know, is the maximum). It's stacked as fuck. It was hype as fuck. It's a crime to say 2019 even comes close.
You arbitrarily decided FPX are by far the bes then closed your eyes and made up the rest to fit that narrative. It's honestly not even worth me arguing with someone making such ridiculous conclusions.
2019 clearly had 4 title contenders, they all made semis. 2021 had 4 title contenders, 3 of them made semis. End of conversation.
they were miles behind FPX and would possibly lose to IG as well (although it's just speculation)
FPX >> IG >= G2 > T1
a year with one *very* clear favorite and only three "strong" teams that are nowhere near said favorite is anything but stacked, unless you don't care about LPL and to you the final was G2 vs T1 then 2021 is *still* better because damwon vs t1 was a way better series anyways
in 2021 both RNG and EDG were worlds-winning caliber rosters, all 3 LCK teams were worlds winning caliber rosters, it's a *way* more stacked year than 2019 where everything was really decided before it began
Were they? They were losing lanes most worlds and when they got forced to play really good teams from that worlds they flatlined hard. You cant watch that finals and try to defend G2 as something special, they were lucky to be on the side they were on.
2nd best team based on what? Easier bracket placement.
If g2 and fnatic switched spots g2 get 3-0'd in quarters by FPX then get forgotten about.
I dont think G2 were better than IG or Griffin that tournament. At best they were number 4 in my eyes but even fnatic played FPX better in a best of 5 than g2
Man, that still gives me goosebumps, I really really enjoyed that G2 lineup, it was so exciting to have an EU team who weren't immediately considered the underdogs. I remember all the top 20 player lists having Caps right up the top, with the rest of the boiz not far behind. And yeah, mad respect to the other semifinalists, super stacked and enjoyable rosters.
I remember that week after QF and just before SF. That was the first time in a long while that no one for sure knows who’s going to win. There were no overwhelming favorites and every team was on the same tier.
The theme song already foreshadowed the winner.
Honestly a lot of people had the same feeling for every team in playoffs outside of splyce; fnatic, damwon and griffin were all possible contenders. I remember never being more hyped prior to a worlds playoffs than that year, really felt like anyone could take it.
DWG was a good team, but they still had the Nuclear problem and the Don't Wanna Go mindset. I don't think anyone considered them contenders, especially since they would have to face SKT next.
Wrong every1 was saying skt will destroy g2 Even wen g2 pounded em ina second bo5 dst year, won 3-1 ppl were saying " skt lost 3-1 but dey played better cuz dey got more barons. "
Groups C and D were also ridiculously stacked with the RNG-SKT-FNC and IG-DWG-TL groups, though that took a lot of the excitement out of groups A and B.
TL got grouped with the previous world champs and the next year world champs lol pain
And they were 1 game from getting out but got turbo dicked by rookie :(
was that the game when TL countered Qyiana mid with LB and jensen got dicked so hard it was beyond imagination how hard you can lose winning match up?
He literally roamed mid and top on repeat and snowballed the game into oblivion. Such pain as a TL fan.
Solokills jensen lvl 4 and instantly buys mobi boots. Absolute madlad
Yeah. That was a rough tournament for Jensen, probably his worst international event ever
Yes
Yup then Doublelift defended him publicly into Jensen not defending Doublelift's short slump/lack of motivation from having no jungler and MSI being cancelled. Also xmithie got swapped out for a more 'mechanical' jungler for a better mid/jg duo when Jensen made that game absolutely unplayable for xmithie.
yes :(
Nope
I think this might have been the most stacked worlds ever lol
C/D were ridiculous. No one can convince me that Splyce or Griffin were better than RNG. Hell TL was probably better than Splyce
Splyce could have been in the same group as TL instead of Damwon. Group D: Team Liquid, AHQ, Invictus Gaming & Splyce. Group C: Funplus Phoenix, Gigabyte Marines, J-Team & Damwon.
Thats a tragedy. Still on the TL boys for not getting it done though
I could see GRF being better than RNG, though I'd 100% take TL over SPY.
Griffin tied g2 with a 5-1 so honestly they stomped the group as much as g2 did. They might have gotten mismatched against ig of all teams (even if they lose the other matchups too) because theshy was going all out again in 2019 which made sword (arguably the weakest eliminations toplaner) a one sided affair that most people remembered for the griffin series
Griffin was exploding because of internal drama, they had a solid groups performance but their playoffs performance was awful.
That playoffs performance was so tragic, did not do that team justice for how good they were
Griffin was 6-1.
RNG will defo topple over GRF lol, both games against SKT they lost by an inch
G2 got turbostomped back to back switching comps with Griffin and then won in semis vs SKT, so...
G2 isn't known for having the best group stages.
Ig got turbostomped by fnatic in 2018 den beat fnatic in finals so.
I'm not sure about that, if we use the "they lost both games by an inch" logic, then FNC in theory should not have advanced either. The skill levels of GRF and RNG were close enough that it's difficult to tell for certain. This sort of equivalence makes no sense.
Nah I disagree. RNG legit looked like cripples in week 2 of groups.
Wtf an InformalMarch take I unironically agree with, and it's downvoted.
I'm not so sure about that, FPX had to play a tiebreaker with SPY (now MAD Lions) to get 1st in group. SPY was good enough to make into knockouts in a harder group, though if TL would have been placed in Group B, they could have a better chance to make it out of the groups.
FPX in groups =/= FPX in playoffs lol
No need to remind me to that, I know I just wanted to say SPY wasn't just a pushover like others pretending it here
They nearly lost to UOL, they just had the easiest group in Worlds history besides maybe 2018 A
This goes for pretty much every LPL team ever but reddit has alzheimers
not in a bo5
I think that can be inferred from the fact we're walking about the group stage.
>TL was probably better than Splyce Based on what? Everybody seems to be gassing up 2020 TL but outside of the nice opening game vs DWG they struggled to beat aHq twice and that's pretty much their run.
Idk about Griffin. They were just really unlucky to draw IG. YamatoCannon even said that he thought they were potentially a top 3 team in that Worlds.
Group B was legit, people overlook JTeam because they were from LMS, but that team was legit. Iirc they almost took FPX down twice.
Because FPX was playing bad. It's still the easiest group of the past 5 years.
2021 group b might have been easier, I really doubt either rogue or c9 make it out of group d Edit: group A was the easy one
in what world is a group with the champion and the 3rd best team at the tournament easier than Fpx JTeam Splyce and Gigabyte Marines?
Am I thinking of the wrong group? 2021 b was dw, c9, rogue and fpx right
Thats group a
Oh my bad, I meant group A then
That was group A
Those SKT RNG games in groups were imo some of the most entertaining games ever, and same w IG DWG
The SKT group was actually stacked Group D wasn't that strong.. dwg were a 3rd place LCK team and IG were complete boom.. barely scraped into worlds AND switched junglers mid worlds.. and the last team was TL and LCS team (not much more needs to be said) Rng were def a top 8 team.. and got completely fucked by a terrible system/minor mistakes vs skt x2 Fnc also managed to have 5 game series vs G2 one the top 3 favorites for worlds Skt from what I remeber was the favorite for the whole thing.. with people saying the effort switch for mata was massive and a difference maker
DWG were a 2nd place regular season LCK team that had the same record as GRF (pretty much Baby Thunder), iG's core was still intact from their championship roster, and TL had managed to take down a 9-1 iG in a BO5.
2019 was probably the holistically strongest worlds we’ve ever seen (strongest LPL, strongest LCS, strongest LEC, arguably one of the strongest LCK w/ GRF, DWG, and SKT superteam), but everyone still thinks FPX is one of the weakest teams to win lol
to be fair LWX was running it down in groups, but was insane in finals iirc. i remember LWX just kaisa ulting solo into enemy team and being one shot multiple times
ulting into veigar's cage pepelaugh
Lwx had insane summer split, playoffs, semis quarters finals and ppl still underrate him coz of few bo1 in groups in his first ever international tournament :(
Because it was the first time 90% of western fans saw him play.
LuLWX is too coinflip. G2 was unlucky FPX got heads instead of tails
Agreed even IG that year in worlds was nuts despite the series vs FPX ending in rather tragic fashion.
> strongest LCS wasn't that the year TSM went 0-6?
I think your memory is not having the strongest year.
Nope.
That was 2020
No, it was the year in which CG went 0-6.
Ah okay my b
>but everyone still thinks FPX is one of the weakest teams to win lol I think that stems from the fact they didn't have to play a single Korean team to win the tournament. Not saying I agree with this sentiment, but it sure didn't harm them that they dodged all those Korean teams.
FPX won worlds 2019.. RNG was not in semis
Learn how to read Hilarious this is upvoted. Now I’m just waiting to get proved I’m an idiot.
He's edited the post. It said RNG instead of FPX when I posted :D
[https://i.imgur.com/5g6fJe8.png](https://i.imgur.com/5g6fJe8.png)
No
That IG FPX series was amazing. Not the best league you've ever seen but damn was it fun to watch.
Its always Western fans who say cringey shit like this. It’s world semis. It is, by definition, almost the best League competition.
Bruh what are you talking about? They are talking about the series itself not the entire competition. Not every bo5 has the best league you ever see. Some bo5 are higher quality than others at world.
Yep. SKT vs ROX in 2016 semis is still imo the best bo5 in LoL history. Two teams playing at an incredibly high level. Some years you have insane matchups and other years it’s not as good.
The seemingly random MF as Zyra counter made this series like ten times better than anything else. Everyone was confused, including casters and fucking Faker (!) himself.
Yeah SSG vs H2k really was the best league competition
Where FPX?
FPX got eliminated by Fnatic in groups, don't you remember? /s
it was a big Sjokz for all viewers
dont
big fan Sjokz! will miss you at MSI :(
Best teaser video Riot ever put out.
Worlds 2019 was really fun in general. Even groups was exciting.
2021 T1-Gen.G-DK-EDG seems more stacked to me.
Yeah I feel like both semifinals AND the finals going to 5 games signals a level of competition that hasn’t really been seen before. Maybe 2016? Seriously it felt like 3/4 teams in 2021 had a very, very real chance of winning it all. For 2019 it felt like we got “counter” matchups where FPX knew they won literally as soon as they saw g2 win.
H2K drags down the level of semis in 2016 too much for 2016 to contend overall imo, even though ROX, SKT, and Samsung were all very strong
H2Korean teams in finals
Yea this post feels weird and out of nowhere considering how good the Semifinals were last year. I guess people still want to disrespect GenG despite them taking EDG to 5 games, but I guess that only matters when a western team like MAD does it.
I don't think it's because GenG or the 2021 semis lineup is worse imo, it's just that the meta in 2021 was defined by being safe and vision control. They're good, sure, but it's not as exciting. Kinda like a top tier boxing match but half the time they were just cuddling.
This sub likes to upvote random nonsense takes like OP's post.
One semifinal was good they other one was a shitshow. Last year's overall level was terrible at worlds.
I agree, and these teams actually felt like they performed way harder than some of the 2019 teams (IG, SKT). With the exception of DK in the finals it felt like the teams last year were really playing to their limits and it was super fun to watch
GEN is a worse team than RNG. I think Meiko said after worlds he’s most scared of facing RNG in QF.
You don't know if they're a worse team. RNG struggled 2-1 against HLE in groups and HLE was a lot worse than Gen.G.
To be fair Fudge said in scrims HLE were better than GenG. FBI also said HLE were the strongest they scrimmed. I still think GenG were better but HLE that worlds should not be overlooked
HLE got 3-0 destroyed by T1. Gen.G easily 3-0'ed Cloud9 and was up 2-1 on EDG. They are in Finals if Clid/BDD played one fight better.
Not at all.
Yeah I feel like both semifinals AND the finals going to 5 games signals a level of competition that hasn’t really been seen before. Maybe 2016? Seriously it felt like 3/4 teams in 2021 had a very, very real chance of winning it all. For 2019 it felt like we got “counter” matchups where FPX knew they won literally as soon as they saw g2 win.
People were saying DWG had it in the pocket after beating T1
I would personally put Worlds 2014 top 4 as more stacked relative to it's time period than Worlds 2019, but 2019 is a close second.
Don't think that's a great comparison, Samsung White was just MILES ahead of every other team at that tournament.
SSW > SSB >>>>>> the rest Shame KT Arrows weren't there even though they won OGN Summer...
That narrative is just not true. It’s so weird that the casters went on about it and everyone just absorbed the narrative. They consistently lost to Samsung blue throughout the year and was the second Samsung team. They had a good game against Blue and Dade is the infamous international tilter and went on to win, if they had more OGN teams in the tournament I don’t think they could have won. They were not the best team in the most competitive tournament of OGN 2014. SKT stomped them winter, and Samsung blue stomped them in spring/ summer.
Its basically MSI 2019 semis minus TL lol
2019 was gigachad year(duh). And as EU enjoyer i also love 2018, 3 western midlaners in semis. Can we make repeat of that, but with slightly different outcome, please?
This is controversial but I will disagree here. The FPX side of the bracket was much stronger than the G2 side by quite a bit. Looking at how G2 got ran out of the building in finals on top of SKT throwing large leads vs G2 I really don't see how that side isnt seen as a large drop in quality. We way overrated G2 and SKT from that worlds imo
I still feel G2 just didn't show up on the day of the finals. Both G2 and T1 were playing like virtuosos in their semifinal. T1 picking up the Yasuo Gragas bottomlane was fantastic, and then Caps carrying through the midlane to close out the series. Fantastic play all around. I don't want to take anything away from FPX, they were better on the day. I don't see the same disparity between the sides of the brackets you do.
G2 performed pretty much the same in semis and finals. Both series they were falling behind early and often in games but FPX didnt make errors when G2 pressured the map a bit where SKT did. Like when you compare Gold difference at 10, 15 and 20 the series are almost identical with G2 being down by similar amounts. Difference was FPX was a really good team who shut G2 out with those big leads while SKT threw them away. The same thing happened in the final day for G2 against griffin, they got blown out.
That's not true. G2 found leads in the Fpx series, they were just outplayed. In game 1 they certainly did and in game 3 as well if I recall correctly.
Game 1 G2 had a lead all game long, game 3 was close in gold as well. G2 was a stomp tho
Had a lead all game long? [https://i.imgur.com/cxNTQYz.jpg](https://i.imgur.com/cxNTQYz.jpg) Stop trying to gaslight people lol, they had a lead for 10 mins of the game against a GP
Gold was even until about 17 minutes after which G2 literally had a gold lead till the 30 minute mark, what are you talking about. That's most of the game in control.
I heard fpx was doing worse against skt in scrim so maybe it a counter matchup that world. Something like skt < g2 < fpx < skt so fpx just rolled g2 in final as a result.
i heard that was cuz doinb was cosplaying gimgoon
someone in FPX said they were getting ready to get kicked out of the tournament and go home because they had 20% wr against skt. They didn't understand how skt lost to g2
Yea crazy things happen in competition all the time but some are truly surprising. If you tell me that fpx would go last in groups last year considering that they were one of the favorite, I would have call you crazy lol.
Well, playstyles do have direct counters. G2 couldn't handle Doinb, maybe SKT could have ? And it seemed like it according to scrims. IG would also have blasted G2 if they went to finals. IG and FPX were kinda similar in power level
Well, according to scrims DWG would have obliterated G2 but we all know scrims don't mean anything most of the time so maybe SKT would have lost to FPX too
That's why I'll stand to my opinion of "G2 had the stage/international experience gap". That's surely what happened here.
I think their brackets were probably the most evenly matched tbh. Fpx had IG and FNC. G2 had DWG and SKT. The Fpx vs Ig series ended in a 3-1 but in all honesty should have gone to game 5 which may have ended up in IG winning if it wasnt for some mistakes by Jkl and theshy, kind of same to how skt threw vs g2 in the midgame. It is also fair to say that DWG was a better team than FNC. The g2-skt-fpx matchups based on the scrim stories seems like a rock paper scissor thing where when one is take out of the equation there is a clear winner but since it is based on scrims it is difficult to speculate.
My rankings come out of this worlds were this, all based on play we saw in groups but mostly bracket stage. 1. FPX 2. IG 3. Griffin (they clearly figured G2 out in groups when we say week 2 speedrun matches similar to FPX in finals) 4. G2 5. SKT 6. FNC 7. DWG 8. RNG 9. TL 10. Splyce
The teaser was the reason why 2019 worlds is my most favourite worlds of all time
This year was pretty stacked as well if you look at all the star players on the 4 teams’ rosters
Last year was really bad with only T1 and DWG having a good grasp on the meta for 90% of the tournament.
DWK Lost in a convincing manner to EDG in finals, but holy fuck how epic was T1/DWK ? Insane drafts and gameplay from both sides. Ofc we overreacted as hell and wrote off the otherside of the bracket (WE were proven wrong), that was the best international BO5 since SKT/ROX
It had very good highs, T1/DWK was epic, but the rest of the tournament was so bad.
really not sure how ur missing edg, they played a shit ton of graves top and enchanters too
Was hoping for a western team win after so many years.
Obligatory where is NA champion?
One of the few worlds where it felt like the 4 best teams in the world were all in semis Another reason why double elim is sorely needed
I think IG being top 4 is arguable. They were absurdly lucking by drawing Griffin which is a perfect stylistic matchup. TheShy clowned so hard on Sword and it's the only reason IG won that series. In another draw I think Griffin gets top 4. GRF might've done better than IG against certain teams imo.
Keep in mind IG also put in Ning for playoffs, so that's part of the reason why they did way better than in groups.
Griffin winning a bo5? Good joke mate
Griffin was better than G2
IG was top 4.. of the LPL.
They were legit better than all the teams that didn't make top 8 that year at worlds (maybe we could argue DAMWON but Nuclear was trash) and LPL was legit the best region in the worlds that year So yeah. Safe to say they were one of the 4 best teams in the world..
They were the 4th best team of the LPL, so no they weren't top 4 worldwide.
You realize they placed 3/4th in worlds also, making them the 3/4th ranked team. Being placed 4th in a prior tournament does not mean that’s their ceiling lol
Also RNG were 2nd seed and couldn't make it out of groups Like when did domestic seeding become directly correlated to individual skill
T1/FNC was a rough draw tbh. One of the three had to go home sadly
Neither does being placed 4th in the tournament make them the 4th best team.
But again you have yet to name a team that individual skill wise deserved to be in that top 4......
I did, RNG , Fnatic and DWG for sure.
DWG got ass blasted by G2, RNG wasn't clutch enough when it mattered and FNC outplayed themselves into mentalbooming against FPX. No one of them went out in a "man what if they won hère" manner
Then who was outside of maybe DAMWON was a top 4 team in the world Griffin got dicked by IG Fnatic and splyce also got shafted hard in QFs so they're out of the question. Seeding doesn't mean anything. It's not always indicative of skill. C9 was the 3rd seed at 2016 worlds under CLG but everyone agreed C9 was the better team. Origen was 3rd seed under H2K at 2015 worlds too. RNG was 2nd seed but couldn't even manage to win a group with Fnatic.
>Then who was outside of maybe DAMWON was a top 4 team in the world RNG and FNC were FAR better, DWG was better.. heck even SPY played better vs SKT than IG did vs GRF, that was one of the lowest skillwise series i've ever seen at worlds. >Griffin got dicked by IG Fnatic and splyce also got shafted hard in QFs so they're out of the question. Excuse me what? How the fuck does losing to a different (and far stronger) team make them weaker than IG????????? >Seeding doesn't mean anything. It's not always indicative of skill. C9 was the 3rd seed at 2016 worlds under CLG but everyone agreed C9 was the better team. Origen was 3rd seed under H2K at 2015 worlds too. I completely agree with you, seeding doesn't mean anything, a proof of that could be the fact that IG ,despite being the 4 th best team of the LPL, was seeded 3rd. >RNG was 2nd seed but couldn't even manage to win a group with Fnatic. As if Fnatic was a weak team???????
fpx was the strongest world champion been saying it since forever
2021 semis were the most stacked by far, everyone was a title contender and even T1 surprised everyone by also playing like a title contender In 2019 IG were world champions but they had an incredibly bad year, G2 really only seemed good because LCK was still weak and well, T1 was the only not weak team in LCK. In any case, replay those semis 100 times and FPX wins 98 times, replay 2021 100 times and each team gets at least 10 titles.
Lol you are pulling that so far out of your arse I'm worried for your intestines.
which part did I get wrong? was FPX way above everyone else? yes they were, clearly evidenced by not only results but also everything prior to them was IG struggling? yes they were, they got to semis but their opponents were imploding griffin, a good team but an empty shell of their former selves was G2 strong? kinda, definitely stronger than T1 but *still* nowhere FPX and it was clear as hell. you *could* hold their groups against them (can't even beat exploding griffin), but it's just bo1s so it's not really fair. a good team, not even close to any of 4 teams in 2021 was T1 strong? they weren't bad I guess, but if you're so much weaker than G2, you're just there to get beaten up A year with three teams that are there to get beaten up, with T1 being clearly weaker than the other three is nowhere near 2021 Let's ignore some facts and put ourselves into gigantic hopium of EU fan who believed that G2 is FPX level. Is 2019 as stacked as 2021? Still not even close, it's *still* just two teams, compared to 2021 which had 3 roughly equal strength teams (Damwon, EDG, RNG) and two more teams that surprised everyone by also playing at their level (T1 and GenG). Out of 5 roughly equal strength *worlds title contenders*, 4 of them went to semis (which you know, is the maximum). It's stacked as fuck. It was hype as fuck. It's a crime to say 2019 even comes close.
You arbitrarily decided FPX are by far the bes then closed your eyes and made up the rest to fit that narrative. It's honestly not even worth me arguing with someone making such ridiculous conclusions. 2019 clearly had 4 title contenders, they all made semis. 2021 had 4 title contenders, 3 of them made semis. End of conversation.
G2 also seemed really good because, well... They were really good.
they were miles behind FPX and would possibly lose to IG as well (although it's just speculation) FPX >> IG >= G2 > T1 a year with one *very* clear favorite and only three "strong" teams that are nowhere near said favorite is anything but stacked, unless you don't care about LPL and to you the final was G2 vs T1 then 2021 is *still* better because damwon vs t1 was a way better series anyways in 2021 both RNG and EDG were worlds-winning caliber rosters, all 3 LCK teams were worlds winning caliber rosters, it's a *way* more stacked year than 2019 where everything was really decided before it began
Were they? They were losing lanes most worlds and when they got forced to play really good teams from that worlds they flatlined hard. You cant watch that finals and try to defend G2 as something special, they were lucky to be on the side they were on.
They were pretty good, yes. Second best team in the World I might argue
2nd best team based on what? Easier bracket placement. If g2 and fnatic switched spots g2 get 3-0'd in quarters by FPX then get forgotten about. I dont think G2 were better than IG or Griffin that tournament. At best they were number 4 in my eyes but even fnatic played FPX better in a best of 5 than g2
then the griffin day happened
Tbh, IG was not at it best, T1 with khan effort, one of the weakest semi-finals
Khan wasn't the problem vs G2 at worlds, Faker and Effort were happy gaming
Idk man that 5 man ult on G2 wasn’t really happy gaming to me.
That was during MSI not worlds
No
Man I don't know if I'll ever be more excited than after watching SKT vs G2. That Pyke in the last game was insane.
pain that bracakt was shit without double elm fnc cloud have been in the semi if the drew antoher team
Man, that still gives me goosebumps, I really really enjoyed that G2 lineup, it was so exciting to have an EU team who weren't immediately considered the underdogs. I remember all the top 20 player lists having Caps right up the top, with the rest of the boiz not far behind. And yeah, mad respect to the other semifinalists, super stacked and enjoyable rosters.
this teaser video for semi final was the best ive ever seen in worlds history, so much hype
I was so fucking lucky that these are the only games I saw live [shit seats but oh well](https://i.imgur.com/sKR5CVc.jpg)
I'm still so fucking salty that song they used for the trailer never came out
The G2 - SKT series was the best bo5 ever at worlds fight me! (yes even better than Rox - Skt)
Wasn’t even the best EU vs KR series at Worlds.
Funny how FPX probably should’ve been the worst team out of all of them