LCS 2021: Ranking All the Starting LCS Top Laners

4. Barney “Alphari” Morris (Team Liquid)

At the time of the signing, this looked like an absolute slam-dunk for Team Liquid. Many fans thought they were snatching the best top laner in Europe away from the LEC where he had been languishing for years, myself included. But a deeper dive into the numbers raises a few concerns.

First, Alphari’s champion pool is among the weakest in the LCS. He only played 15 champions in 2020 but only demonstrated an elite level of play on one, Gangplank.

Like the man he replaced, Impact, Alphari has a very weak aKDA due to a low kill-to-assist ratio. But, curiously, he also had fewer solo kills on the year than Impact, despite being known as a more aggressive top laner.

Now, his reputation is backed up by the fact that he has proven to be an exceptional laner, even against strong competition. His 511.3 MAGXD @ 15 is the second-best of all LCS top laners going into 2020. That said, his damage output (5.8 EDD) and gold per minute (381) are both around the average for his role.

Alphari is coming into the LCS with the bigger expectations of the two top lane imports. While he will certainly outperform Finn, I’m not sure if he’s going to establish himself among the upper echelon of LCS top laners.