Plat Breakdown Power Rankings #3
Hey all CTRL ULT ELITE back at it once again. This week marks the end of the regular season and we are now getting into playoffs. We have gone from 21 teams in platinum down to the top 12. Congratulations to every team that made it wish I was able to join you! Games this week are for seeding. So every team will play 3 games on Tuesday against 3 other teams. These teams will be the teams with the same standing in you in other groups. For example if you are 1st seed you get to play the other 1st seeds from each division as well as a 2nd seed team. The 3rd seeds will play all of the 3rd seed teams and a random 4th seed team. The top 4 teams are given a bye week automatically advancing to the quarter finals. Here is a fancy infographic done by Poptart! I also reached out to interview every playoff team and was able to interview most of them. The time it would take me to implement quotes by making youtube videos and cutting sound bites is a little much for this week. I am going to look into trying to use them next week.
This week I made a poll and the overwhelming winner was to do Power rankings again instead of breaking down like I have been doing. I am going to be sorting teams into one of 4 tiers similar to my last power rankings. S Tier teams are the teams that I fully expect to be in the grand finals and to win BOL. S tier teams are generally going to be the 1st seeds from their division and have players in the top 25. S tier teams will have either a key carry or a draft plan that has been demonstrated this season. A Tier teams will be the teams that I expect to challenge the S tier teams. They will have a really strong individual player or a core team identity but may lack the depth or had key players swap out. The teams in B tier I think have a shot at winning a series but I doubt they can make a deep playoff run. I'm expecting them to make it to the top 8. Teams in C tier I think are not going to win a playoff series; they are primarily going to be teams found as the 4th seed in their division.
Crustacean Nation
Top: Elsa From Frozen
Jung: TehSplash
Mid: Watercat AD: Teegarden
Support: DragonMoonCake
Average ELO: Plat 2 Roster Changes: A new mid laner in Watercat
So it should come to no surprise to anyone that I have Crustacean Nation sitting at the top of S tier. I am really hyped on this team and am excited to see them on stream Tuesday. CN had a fantastic season, the best season out of everyone in BOL Plat with only the 1 game loss. CN still has the stats to back them up as the best team in the league. CN lead the league in kills and assists as well as the lowest deaths a game giving them the highest team KDA score out of every team in BOL. They take the most towers, are the only team taking over 1 inhibitor a game and have the most CS a game out of every playoff team and take baron more than any other team just to round things out. Most captains feel that Shurmia was the weakest division. It will be curious to see if this team has some inflated stats but every division had teams that were not as strong as the rest of their counterparts.
As far as individual players Teegadrin the ADC of this team feels that they do not have a specific X factor; everyone on this team plays well together and can take turns carrying. As far as individual stats go (LædyLight) has the number 1 stats in the league having a KDA of almost 15 in their 4 games with 65% KP but they were brought late into the season as Skifter ranked out. I mean Elsa From Frozen is the only top laner in our entire league in the top 25 as a top laner. But I can talk tons about every player on this team no one on this team is out of the top 30 individuals when it comes to stats.
CB Rush
Top: Pipp
Jung: Hunterwolfsteel5
Mid: CBR Rutledge AD: gl4cial
Support: CBR loveme
Average ELO: Plat 1
Roster Changes: New Support in CBR loveme
So CB Rush are the undisputed best team heading out of Targon to no one's surprise. CB Rush has won quite a few seasons of BOL plat and are a team looking to add yet another title as they cruised through this season dropping only 2 games. As a team CB Rush have some very impressive stats they take the most dragons out of every team in the league at 3.3 a game. They have the 2nd highest team KDA(more or less tied with EM) are 2nd in towers taken a game with 7.8, take 1.3 inhibitors a game(tied for second most). This team has also a very fast winning time taking wins on average by 28:45. This team only dropped 2 games this season as well one to Hypnotic(big surprise this team fell apart they were a lot better than their record suggested) and a game to Iceborn Chaos where they drafted poorly and had no answer when Jinx was able to pick up some early kills. Other than that CB Rush has won their games in convincing fashion playing lots of different champions not being afraid to experiment.
The strength of CB Rush is not just in their laning they are incredible at macro timing. But like this team has 4 of their players in the top 20 and 2 are even top 10 no one is a slouch. Pipp is all the way down at like number 70 but this still puts him as the 5th best starting top laner. As Pipp put it “my teams too good I don’t even get a chance to join them some weeks before the games over”. Pipp and Teggardin both have firmly felt that the only team to possibly contend with them is the other. Both think that EM and TGA will not be able to go the distance in a series.
Elementals Maelstrom
Top: TheRealOogway
Jung: PeIIi
Mid: Nèzumi AD: defly
Support: DMForScholarship
Average ELO: Plat 2
Roster Changes: New jungle in PeIIi
Listen I realize that Elementals Maelstrom have some absolutely insane stats but I have them in A tier for a reason. I truthfully think that CN and CB Rush are a step above this team and every team I interviewed listed those 2 teams as the only teams that they would not want to play in quarter finals. This team has not really been challenged whatsoever other than week 2 when they lost to Titan Gaming Atlas. This team was even denied a chance to play vs a full power Mystic Cat as they played Mystic Cats week 1 who were brought in as a subustion and only had 2 of their starting 5 in the lineup. Mystic Cats even had someone in their offrole. Granted when EM lost to TGA it was the week that they swapped junglers and EM won a game in that series, but those 2 games EM lost were not close. Other than that series EM has 2-0 every team they played quickly. To build on my point the average game time for this team was 26:36 and that is the fastest out of every team. That's fantastic your games have all been stomps! But that's the problem. I know the 3 teams on top of this division are good. The rest of your division frankly was not in my opinion. Ta Wild side I think was one of the worst teams in the league. Literal monkeys were not competitive either; they have the worst objective team stats in the league. TA tropics had tons of roster issues having 9 different people play on this team and multiple players swapping positions. I think seeding is going to be very illuminating this week and I’m very excited to see the results. It's quite possible that I am dead wrong and EM are a team that is going to dominate the playoffs but I’m not convinced.
Nèzumi is head and shoulders above the rest of this team they are a certified banger of a player. Pelli in his interview told me that Nèzumi is the team's X factor. He has the potential to solo carry a game for them being the 4th highest rated player in the league. All of this team is highly rated other than TheRealOogway and I am not sure why they are rated so low(I think the stats hate top laners or something they are generally the lowest rated player on most teams).
Sensei Squad Susanoo
Top: Orphic
Jung: SQD Vaulter88
Mid: lavalizard8u AD: Water Bear
Support: SQD Zippy
Average ELO: Plat 3
Roster Changes: New ADC in WaterBear
Sensei Squad Susanoo is another team that I expect to get top 4 in their inaugural split together and LavaLizard their mid agrees with me. Lavalizard8u feel that they are by far the strongest 3rd seed team and the 2nd seed in Shurmia belongs to them or CB White not NWET. Sensei Squad are an interesting team they do not win off of any 1 particular standout stat or player. They of course have star players along with other A tier teams. Lavalizard is in the top 20 of stats and SQDVaulter88 is just behind them sitting at number 28. But the player on this team with the X factor, the raw 1v9, is their top laner Orphic. Orphic has played some games where he just went no we win this game I’m huge on picks like Jax, Gwen even Yorick. SQD Zippy has been picking up steam as the split goes on learning more and more supports so better help round out draft for this team.
As far as macro team stats SQD are middle of the road in objective totals among playoff teams. 2.3 dragons a game is by no means bad but it is not elite the same as their 6.5 towers a game. SQD has the lowest average baron count of every playoff team that will hopefully be rectified. This team is also fairly middle of the road even when it comes to KDA and gold generation. They have a team KDA of 3.79 which is right in the middle at 6th in post playoff world.
Titan Gaming Atlas
Top: Rågnar
Jungle: Vxpir
Mid: Ham Sandw1ch
ADC: ACIick
Support: ArabeIIa
Average ELO: Plat 3
Roster Changes: New mid laner and support in ArabeIIa and Ham Sandw1ch
So Titan Gaming Atlas are the team in A tier I am the least sure on the placement of. I think that this team has such a clear draft plan they have more or less stuck to the same plan all of the regular season. It has worked really well for them. TGA almost always in draft take a Supertank top, a fighter jungle, counter pick mid or play a strong control mage and a bot lane with push potential. TGA i think has 2 major points of strength they have a really clean Macro game; they make sure to group for neutral objectives, tying for the most dragons taken a game and being just behind CN in barons taken a game. This team's other strength is Ham Sandw1ch in mid. Ham Sandw1ch has quickly shot up the player scores in our league. They average the most kills a game and have the highest damage per minute in the league.
My other major concern(besides flexibility in draft) is that TGA has a new support. AU KnuckeD was honestly probably the 2nd best player on this team and they are no longer here. Aclick told me that this team is still just as good and are a lock for top 4. They did lose 0-2 to the Mystic Cats in the last week so that is why I have them in the bottom of A tier. I’m skeptical of the statement. Rågnar has evolved his game and became the rock that his team needs, playing weak-side(more specifically Ornn) almost every game and doing well. They are number 2 in the league among all top laners and one of the only reasons that Ornn has anywhere near a positive win rate is due to Rågnar winning almost every game he plays on it.
TA Akatsuki
