Rating and ranking all 24 top laners at the League of Legends World Championship
By Josh Tyler
18. Chen “Ziv” Yi (AHQ) – 71 OVR
A veteran of the World Championship, you would expect Ziv to have a leg up on the competition he faces, even if it is in a major region like the LMS. However, Ziv has been a massive disappointment this year, posting a 2.19 aKDA and -0.84 laning score. Although he can usually come out of lane with a small gold lead (55g at 15 minutes) the fact that he only recorded two solo kills in 30 games shows that he’s not dominating his lane like a world-class top should.
17. Shunsuke “Evi” Murase (DetonatioN FocusMe) – 73 OVR
As DFM dominated the LJL, Evi tended to do the same in his top lane kingdom. He posted a 0.61 laning score and 3.49 Kill Efficiency, thanks to a 3.33 aKDA and 12 solo kills in 21 games. However, while Evi’s individual play has been stellar, he doesn’t tend to translate his leads into advantages for his team. His below-average 382.6 adjusted gold per minute indicates that he’s not turning those kill and farm leads into objectives often enough.
16. Hsu “Rest” Shih-Chieh (J-Team) – 74 OVR
Rest may be the epitome of a “just let me split” player. He has the worst adjusted kill participation of any top laner at Worlds with 86.7% and accounts for a staggering amount of his team’s deaths (29.7% death share). This is, however, in stark contrast with the fact that his 422.9 aGPM and 0.65 laning score paint him as a fairly solid player at getting leads and resources, but his below-average damage outputs (429.2 aDPM) shows that he tends to struggle in team fighting.
15. Xie “Langx” Zhen-Ying (RNG) – 75 OVR
The first top laner from one of the big four major regions, surprisingly, comes from a region with some of the strongest top laners in the world. Unfortunately, however, Langx is one of the worst out of the bunch. In particular, his pitiful 374.1 aGPM and 324.4 aDPM indicate that he is a player often abandoned by his team. Although he manages to not die (averaging 1.9 deaths per game), when his most played champions are lane bullies like Renekton and Aatrox, it says a lot that his team doesn’t see fit to try and give him even a decent amount of resources.
14. Tamás “Vizicsacsi” Kiss (Splyce) – 75 OVR
Only one top laner at Worlds come close to equaling Hani for laning incompetence, and that would be Vizicsacsi. He averages fairly large gold and experience deficits at 15 minutes (304g and 274 XP) and has one of the highest average deaths per game of all tops in the tournament. Luckily, his rating is buoyed by the fact that he’s going against strong competition, but Csacsi could easily get bullied by some of the better tops
13. Atit “Rockky” Phaomuang (MEGA) – 76 OVR
It may seem blasphemous to rank a top laner from a small region like Southeast Asia above tops from dominant regions like China and EU, but Rockky is a veteran player with two MSI and one Worlds appearance to his name. In the LST, Rockky has shown himself to be a class above the rest, averaging over 1000 gold, 20 CS, and 670 XP advantages at 15 minutes, along with averaging 0.75 solo kills per game. That kind of dominance domestically should translate to him being able to at least hold his own at Worlds.