Mid lane
Jackson “KatEvolved” Dohan
Julien “Julien” Gelinas
Michael “Wolfe” Taylor
Aidan Joseph “5fire” Reckamp
5fire and Julien are returning to Scouting Grounds after participating in the 2018 event. Julien also played in the 2017 Scouting Grounds, making it the third time in four events he is on the list. Yet since he remains undrafted and has yet to see any Academy or professional playtime so I think this needs to be his last shot at the event.
Wolfe plays collegiate League of Legends at Maryville University but also saw some professional play as early as 2016. This seems like a reach to me as to why he got an invite. Again I don’t feel he’s a fresh prospect that teams need to find more than rehashing talent from three years ago.
KatEvolved is the interesting name. He seems to be the most well-known thanks to a popular stream and YouTube channel and high level of skill with Katarina. I always thought he was a one-tick, but it’s good to see him branch out and I’m eager to see what he can do at this event.
ADC
Bradley “Vex” Miller
Alex “Gorica” Gorica
Evan “EvanRL” Lawson
Frank “Tomo” Lam
Vex is a top 15 rated player on the ladder and has played on a few amateur teams. Gorica is a college player, a teammate of Winton at the University of Western Ontario, as is EvanRL (a fellow Maryville product). Tomo comes in as a highly rated amateur prospect. I think this group is a good representation of how to select prospects for this kind of event.
Support
Jordan “Shady” Robison
Garrett “Gweiss” Weiss
Anthony “SandPaperX” Mak
Johnathan “CHIME” Pomponio
Gweiss, SandPaperX and CHIME are current amateur players without professional experience. Shady was on TSM Academy in 2018 and Phoenix1 in 2017. He plays for Maryville University currently and might be on the very fringe of being called a prospect due to that professional experience. Overall I do feel like this is a good grouping of support talent that is closer to true prospects than repeating talent making its way through again.
Overall this looks to be a talent class of players to watch. This 2019 class has the tough challenge to match, or exceed 2018, which saw 11 of the players at Scouting Grounds play for LCS, or academy teams after playing in the event.
The highlight of this is 100 Thieves top laner Aaron “FakeGod” Lee winning rookie of the split for Summer Split 2019. Showing that if you can take this event seriously you can find some talent to develop and build you’re team around. Worth following if you want to see what the future of the LCS will look like.