Hazardous Takes

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Hey gang! Welcome back to another season of BOL in which the stat lines are made up and the KDAs don't matter! I'll be your host for the content portion of this electrifying season of ganks, flanks, and hazardous takes, so let's get down to it.

First question: Who is this guy? Hi, I'm Hazard, aka OccupationalHzrd, some of you old men may know me as Vaunted Dream. I'm currently jungling for Clown Gaming Forklift Certified in BOLE. I'm an occupational therapy doctorate student, soccer referee, and part-time painter. I've played since season 2, competitive since... idk whenever Duo Esports was a thing. Glad to be here!

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This week's content will be divided into 2 sections: Team Rankings and Game Predictions. This will most likely be the typical pattern for future content as well for the sake of consistency, with future ones having player rankings.

Team Rankings:

S Tier: Right out of the gate, two teams instantly fall into the top 2 based on players, past history, and ranks. TTM Tethys and Akuma Sabers.

TTM Tethys:

Composed of long-time comp scene dreamers like Sutekh and iBeyondGodly, this roster shows a lot of promise coming into the new split. I'm unsure on how they bullied DeFaux into paying their entry fee, but many of us know their current rankings (Hello? Sutekh E4? Vaulter E1?) doesn't reflect their true capabilities on the rift. This team promises a strong jungle-support core with highly macro-focused play and a touch of memery for the spice.

Akuma Sabers:

Alright, which one of you let Coffee make yet another championship-level roster and nobody decided to stop him? While I'm disappointed Jokur isn't on the roster, this lineup is scary. Coffee heads up the support role while everyone's favorite cow impersonator Moo-wy takes midlane with Renku backpacking confidently through the Rift's jungle. I personally expect this team to be dominant through the mid-jungle-support roam combination while Toomy just walls off anyone who dares to match him in toplane and ADC powerscales to infinity.

A Tier: These are the teams I expect to lock playoffs anywhere from 3-6 seed but I have high hopes for as of pre-split.

Khan Esports: Another dae, another dream destroyed. Daedream heads up a roster from Khan Esports comprised of absolutely zero emerald players (how much did y'all pay Riot to give you teammates?) and what appears to be a very scrappy playstyle. Jungle (Mytharium) looks to play the more in-your-face picks like Graves, Bel'Veth, Rengar, etc while Dae shows off their roaming picks with Bard, Camille, and Blitz. I would expect this team to look to 2v2/3v3/4v4 at many opportunities and win purely based on hands differential on their skirmish-based champs.

We Love Soulbert: Mish Mash Edition

The army of Soulbert fans has arisen into a musical wonder creating a cacophony of chaos on the once peaceful rift. The resident Kog'Maw enjoyer #koggy has brought in a strong supporting cast for their main-character vibes including jungler Barcode Wrists as the meta-loving best friend (hello Belveth Lillia Rell), FinalNinja as the supportive love interest (Zyra Janna Raka etc), Koality as that one Disney character who looks weak but is lowkey the best character (E4 on paper D1 in our hearts), and Granterino in top as the guest star we don't see until later in the series as a monster scaling Jax. I expect this team to provide a 4.25/5 show to be cancelled after one season but have a passionate fanbase that misses them for long afterwards.

? Tier

These are the teams that I have no idea what will occur nor what to expect as of yet.

Elysium Dawn

The first team in the ?-tier list is Elysium Dawn. They provide two strong solo lanes in Ivy and Ratchet, however they have no support listed and their jungler looks like he's struggling more in soloQ than he is at recovering from his last season of Teemo addiction. I'm curious to see who they pair with Fire in the botlane as if Jungle can get out of his funk and they bring in a decent support this roster could be VERY promising, however when the two most impactful roles are giant question marks I find it concerning.

Pea Team

What do you get when you cross Unwanted Soul with a ban phase? A sad man without a Jarvan IV. I see very creative drafts coming from this team in as support is running many Xerath and Amumu picks combined with potential dual-adc solo lanes (Riot, why make Smolder mid a thing? Why?). I think this team presents as very volatile in the draft phase but may be dominated by teams in the S tier who have a more meta-focused approach to the game.

Brad Balster Gaming

Okay so I'm biased in favor of Echko simply because he's a fellow Zac main and that brings me joy. Combine that with an assassin mid, splitting top, scaling ADC and peel-focused support, and you've got a strong 4-1 stylistic combination that may guide this team to some wins. This team's solo Q rankings are rough and I recognize zero names from previous competitive splits so I'm guarded against their overall success until I see some action, but I like the visuals.

Art of War

Last but not least, Art of War. As a wise book under a similar name has said, "He who knows when he can fight and when he cannot will be victorious"- which may be paramount for this team. The jungler (Counterpicking) looks strong on paper, but the top is stuck E4 with a 48% WR and the mid plays more jungle than mid in soloQ atm so they're hard to judge. Overall, with 3 players in emerald (two in E4) and a lack of players that I know (Counter/Crimsz) this team is a large question mark for me in a competitive league aspect.

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PREDICTIONS FOR WEEK ONE

Akuma 2-0 Elysium

Khan 2-1 WLS

Pea 1-2 BBG

TTM 2-0 AoW