LCS Summer 2020: Rating and Ranking Every Starting LCS Player
By Josh Tyler
We continue our LCS player power ratings and rankings ahead of Summer 2020!
15. Philippe “Vulcan” Laflamme (Cloud9, Support) – 81 OVR (+7)
Speaking of Vulcan, he was undoubtedly the best support in the LCS last year and very surely deserving of first-team All-LCS honors. The biggest questions I have are more related to his consistency.
Going into the spring, I had Vulcan graded as a below-average support who was largely carried by a strong ADC in Cody Sun. Obviously, the Spring Split has flipped that narrative considerably, but I do still wonder how much of Vulcan’s improvement is thanks to Zven, just as I wonder how much of Cody’s decline is thanks to Stunt. That said, he played his brains out in the spring which is why he earned one of the biggest bumps to his rating ahead of Summer 2020.
14. Søren “Bjergsen” Bjerg (TSM, Mid) – 82 OVR (-2)
It is officially time for TSM fans to start worrying if Bjergsen’s best days are behind him, as he put up another below-average split, and his third bad split in his last five. In fact, there were points during the Spring Split where I had Bjergsen graded as one of the worst players (not just mid laners) in the league.
The biggest problem Bjergsen faces is that he’s become a bit too selfless in recent years. Last split, Bjergsen posted the second-lowest damage per minute numbers among LCS mid laners (ahead of only Eika) and was in the bottom half of the table in gold metrics. While he had great KDA and laning numbers on those limited resources, the team wasn’t able to convert that to wins. I’d like to see Bjergsen start to demand more resources in Summer 2020, both in draft and income, to enable him to be that carry player.
13. Yasin “Nisqy” Dinçer (Cloud9, Mid) – 82 OVR (-)
This will be a controversial opinion, to be sure, but I think Nisqy was the biggest beneficiary of being on Cloud9 compared to any of his teammates. While I can confidently say the other four members of C9 were the best in their role in the spring, that’s not the case with Nisqy.
That’s not a knock on Nisqy, who still did spectacularly while being somewhat starved of resources. He had the lowest kill share and gold share among mid laners, but also had among the highest damage to gold ratios and the highest adjusted KDA in the mid lane. However, when your team isn’t allocating you resources, it’s fair to wonder why that is.
12. Vincent “Biofrost” Wang (TSM, Support) – 82 OVR (-1)
Despite having a bit of a “down” split, I still firmly believe Biofrost is a top-three support in the LCS. Now that he’s being reunited with his best laning partner and long-time duo partner Doublelift, I expect that we’re going to see an even better performance than what he posted in the spring.
And let’s remember that in the spring he was pretty darn good, posting a top-three vision score per minute and adjusted KDA. He was one of only three supports to average less than two deaths per game (again, the other two were Vulcan and CoreJJ).
11. Daniele “Jiizuke” di Mauro (Evil Geniuses, Mid) – 82 OVR (-)
Jiizuke took the LCS by storm last year following a slow start and was incredibly integral to Evil Geniuses making a push deep into the playoffs. That said, he was one of the most resource-heavy mid laners in terms of demanding jungle pressure and the share of his team’s gold. Unfortunately, he also often squandered those opportunities with bad deaths.
His 65.9% kill participation and 26.6% damage share are not numbers you’d want to see from a player who got 26.1% of the team’s gold and 30.2% of the team’s kills. He also averaged 2.2 deaths per game and the third-most unforced deaths per game. The only two mid laners with more low-quality deaths per game were Goldenglue and Ry0ma, which is not company you’d like to see Jiizuke keeping.