LCS 2021: Ranking All the Starting LCS Top Laners

1. Eric “Licorice” Ritchie (FlyQuest)

The best top laner in the LCS last year, it’s honestly astounding that he was snubbed from the accolades at the end of the year, given how impressive his performances were. While I was a huge fan of FlyQuest’s top laner from last year, you can’t fault them for jumping on the opportunity to acquire Licorice.

To start, Licorice is one of the few top laners who can claim to have a “champion ocean.” He played 19 unique champions, tied for the most, but demonstrated elite play on four different picks. His Sett, Aatrox, Gangplank, and Ornn were all elite picks, giving him the largest core champion pool of the LCS top laners.

Second, Licorice is a ridiculously good top laner, with a 718.1 MAGXD @ 15. Like Ssumday, he tended to be favored in most matchups but he managed to win those favored lanes hard.

In terms of damage output, he was the only one who managed to stand up against Fudge, and he did it against much tougher competition. His KDA and gold per minute stats were both above average, though not mind blowing, and they are to be expected as a member of one of the most successful teams in LCS history.

His biggest question going into 2021 will be to see whether Licorice can replicate his past success away from the Cloud9 juggernaut. Certainly, he has shown the talent in the past to live up to the top billing.