Rift Rivals Draftkings Notes 6/27

Rift Rivals Notes

Thursday June 27

Draftkings has split up Rift Rivals into 2 slates, one at 3:30 PM ET and one at 5:30 PM ET. I will be going over each of these slates individually with my personal picks to win and who to target from those teams. 

3:30 PM ET (2 Games)

C9 vs G2

G2 are heavy favorites in this match and for good reason, they just won MSI (the last international tournament) and have been performing very well in their native region so far. They have skilled players and good play-makers in every role.  They win games fast and they get lots of kills while doing so with plenty of unique picks and strategies. A very diverse and well-rounded team overall. 

C9 are usually North America's (NA) best hope in international events like this, they always seem to perform well even when overlooked in most circumstances. I do think that they can win this game. C9 has plenty of unique styles and picks of their own, and can potentially surprise G2 with one of those strategies early in the tournament. It is best of 1, so I would not claim it out of the realm of possibility that C9 are able to steal this game away.

However, more often than not, G2 should win this game. They look like one of the best teams in the world and play the "optimal" style of aggressive League of Legends. I will take the heavy favorite here with G2 winning this game. 

Pick: G2 

Players to target: Jankos, Perkz, Mikyx

The whole team is viable honestly, but these are my 3 favorites. Caps can either go off and dominate the entire match, or feed his lane. We will see which Caps shows up. Wunder is a great toplaner as well but kind of expensive in my eyes, still a good choice though.

TL vs FNC

TL have stumbled out of the gate in NA for the Summer Split, after a very good performance at MSI, making the finals before losing the G2. They beat the former world champions IG (from China), and did so in convincing fashion. They have mentioned themselves that the "poor" start in NA has partly been due to these games just not mattering as much, and I think that they will take Rift Rivals more seriously. They are slight underdogs in this matchup, but I think they are just as good as FNC if not better.

 FNC are undefeated in Europe, and were the first team to take a game off of the dominant G2 recently. This recent winstreak may increase the public viewpoint of FNC, but they are still worse than G2 in my eyes. All of the regular season games in NA and EU are best of one games, so you can't draw too many conclusions from those types of matches anyway. I think potential overconfidence could be an issue here for FNC.

TL has one of the best bot lanes in the world (Doublelift and CoreJJ), and I think that Impact has shown tremendous improvement and carry potential for TL. I think they have had some hiccups to start their season, but in mostly meaningless games. This is where I think TL locks in and wins against the slightly favored FNC.

Pick: TL

Players to target:  Doublelift, CoreJJ, Xmithie

Impact is a good choice for top lane, as he is cheap and has high upside. Jensen has not been as involved as I would like, but has that high point ceiling if he is on form. 

 5:00 PM ET (2 Games)

OG vs TSM

OG are a solid team, nothing amazing to me but decent.  They have played pretty good League of Legends overall. They are not like G2 in the sense of crazy picks or anything like that, but they are a good and respectable team that has a good grasp of the meta and how to play it. They are not the most consistent team ever, but I think they have the talent in their team to retain a top 3 spot in EU.

TSM on the other hand are not impressive to me at all. Even in NA where they should be the clear cut third best team or even 2nd, they have struggled to play a clean game of League and always seem to have some sort of long game fiesta that can go either way. I am not confident in their late game decision making, and we will have to see if international TSM is any better than domestic TSM.

Not a huge lean either way, but I think OG are more consistent and more capable of making the right play to win them the game. TSM constantly struggles with team decision making and are all over the place in games that they really shouldn't be.

Pick: OG 

Players to target: Kold, Patrik, Alphari

C9 vs FNC

This is the classic EU vs NA matchup that always seems to happen internationally, and historically more often than not, it has gone the way of FNC. I have already explained how I feel about both of these teams, but I think that C9 have a better chance to steal the game from FNC than they do from G2. Depending on how these teams play in their earlier games, it could influence how this game goes. I still personally think FNC should be favored, but as mentioned previously C9 have a very good shot to steal this one. They can be very unpredictable and have a good coaching staff to make some cheese happen.

Pick: FNC

Players to target: Hylissang, Nemesis, Broxah  

Once again not a super strong lean early on for this match, the play of these two teams in their first matches will be a big tell on how this game could go, so keep an eye out for the results of the first few games of Rift Rivals.

That's it for Day 1 of Rift Rivals from me, I am very excited as a viewer to watch these two regions go head to head and also as an avid DFS player for LOL. 

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