League of Legends LCS: 2020 Preseason Player Ranking

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League of Legends. Photo Courtesy of Riot Games. /

20. Mads “Broxah” Brock-Pedersen (Team Liquid, Jungler) – 80 OVR

The big move for Liquid during the offseason was electing to use their newly-gained import slot on a jungler. Although the move is certainly an upgrade over Xmithie, I didn’t really consider Broxah to be a significant improvement.

With rumors of visa issues possibly forcing TL to start Eugene “Pobelter” Park, this move could certainly set back the defending LCS champions. Not only will Pobelter, a player who couldn’t find an LCS or Academy slot in his native position, be forced to learn a new role, but Broxah will also lose valuable time developing synergy with his new teammates. For a team with aspirations to finally make it out of groups, this kind of risk for a slight upgrade could be a disaster.

19. Nicolaj “Jensen” Jensen (Team Liquid, Mid) – 80 OVR

This is where I would have spent that import slot if I was Liquid, given the talent pool of mid laners available internationally. Jensen is a fine mid laner, but he’s not someone I would be keen to build around as a centerpiece, given his absurdly low kill participation (59.2% raw, 92.1% aKP), low damage output, and subpar laning numbers (he averaged a 133 gold deficit at 10 minutes). Jensen won’t lose Liquid any games, but it’s also unlikely that he will be a significant carry threat that they need against stiff competition.

18. Kim “Ssumday” Chan-ho (100 Thieves, Top) – 80 OVR

After spending just about the entire summer in the Academy league, it’s easy to forget that in the spring Ssumday was one of the most dominant top laners in North America. He did underperform in his limited action during the summer split, but his demotion was more to get the Thieves in line with the import rules than his performance. Ssumday also stomped the competition in Academy, which shows that he will likely be able to return to form against the cream of the LCS crop.

17. Jesper “Zven” Svenningsen (Cloud9, ADC) – 81 OVR

Despite all the memes about being lifted out of the Talent Suppression Machine for greener pastures, Zven actually performed quite well when he was with TSM over the last two years. Last summer, I had him graded as the third-best ADC in the LCS as he was in the top three in just about every category and he’s the only one who beat out Doublelift in damage numbers. Now that he’s on a better team with a better support in Vulcan, I full expect Zven to look even better this year.

16. Cody “Cody Sun” Sun (100 Thieves, ADC) – 81 OVR

One of the ADCs that also challenged Doublelift for the top crown in the LCS, Cody Sun stepped up to prove that 100 Thieves made a terrible mistake benching him before the 2018 World Championship. He posted the best laning stats of any ADC last split and the best gold per minute numbers as well. While he’s on a slightly weaker team in 100 Thieves team going into 2020, he has shown he can be the main carry of their team.

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