Team Liquid acquires mid laner Jensen from Cloud 9

The offseason has arrived with a bang in the North American LCS, as Team Liquid has announced that they will acquire former Cloud 9 mid laner Jensen. Already the strongest team in NA, what does this mean for their ambitions for a Worlds run?

Welcome to Mr. Offseason’s wild ride folks. In perhaps the most stunning transaction in the NA LCS since Doublelift left CLG for TSM three years ago, his new team has gone all in on improving on their back-to-back domestic championships.

Last night, Team Liquid announced that they had bought out the contract of Cloud 9’s star mid laner Nicolaj “Jensen” Jensen. Jensen has spent his entire three and a half year professional playing career in NA with Cloud 9.

Jensen has long been considered one of the top mid laners in North America, and the only mid who was able to challenge TSM’s Soren “Bjergsen” Bjerg. In fact, in Summer 2017 and Summer 2018, Jensen beat out Bjergsen for first team NA LCS all-pro honors in the mid lane, naming him as the best mid in the region.

More from LCS

• EMENES retires following leave from Cloud9, cites military service
• EMENES Donezo Manifesto: Former Cloud9 Midlaner airs out grievances
• C9 Jojopyun: LCS superstar to Cloud9 after “a huge series of events”
• EG Sheiden reportedly staying on Evil Geniuses as starting jungler
• 2023 LCS Summer Split Awards – LCS All-Pro Team

This move makes Team Liquid, already the back-to-back NA LCS Champions from the spring and summer splits in 2018, the heavy favorites to be the top seed out of NA in 2019. After a disappointing performance at Worlds 2018, where Liquid failed to advance out of the group stage despite being North America’s number one seed, Liquid was looking to upgrade its weaker roles including mid lane.

Jensen is not only a clear upgrade over former Liquid starting mid Eugene “Pobelter” Park, but he is also a North American resident, meaning Liquid will not need to expend one of its two import slots on him and can potentially import a support or jungler if they see an upgrade available. Current Liquid top laner Jung “Impact” Eon-yeong recently met the requirements to become eligible as an NA resident.

As of right now, Liquid enters the season with a starting roster of Impact-Xmithe-Jensen-Doublelift-Olleh. Given Impact and Xmithe’s proficiency on tanks, adding a second carry threat to the team will alleviate pressure off AD carry Doublelift and open up Liquid to play through mid lane with more consistency.

This move leaves Pobelter as a free agent, ready to be picked up by a team that could use stability and veteran experience in the mid lane who does not take up an import spot. Potential landing spots for him could be Cloud 9, Golden Guardians, OpTic, FlyQuest, or Echo Fox.

What do you think? Will the addition of Jensen allow Liquid to keep bodying their competition and finally make it out of the group stage?