Breaking Down The Crazy Few Days of League of Legends Roster Moves

After what felt like an incredibly long offseason, these past few days have been chock-full of excitement for League of Legends fans around the globe.

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After what felt like an incredibly long offseason, these past few days have been chock-full of excitement for League of Legends fans around the globe. Live games are back with the start of China and Korea’s Mid Season Cup and we’re finally beginning to see teams announce their opening day rosters for the start of the Summer Split.

With no shortage of surprising roster swaps and eyebrow-raising decisions, it’s been tough trying to keep up with everything that’s happening. There’s no need to fret, however, because here is a breakdown of the biggest moves to happen these past few days.

Dardoch and V1per to Dignitas

“No one wants to pick up Dardoch, that’s not my fault.” In what was perhaps the most talked-about news in League of Legends this year, Team SoloMid president Leena Xu’s controversy with Yiliang “Doublelift” Peng and Joshua “Dardoch” Hartnett caused an explosion in the community when Leena was overheard on Doublelift’s stream saying in a phone call that now-infamous series of words. Well, it turns out she was wrong, as the twenty-two-year-old jungler became the latest player to sign with Dignitas.

Joining Dardoch is former Flyquest top laner Omran “V1per” Shoura, who recently signed with Dignitas after the team let go of Heo “Huni” Seung-hoon. Dignitas came into the Spring Split with moderately high expectations, fielding a roster of grizzled veterans Huni, Henrik “Froggen” Hansen, Zaqueri “aphromoo” Black and up-and-coming rookie Johnson “Johnsun” Nguyen. The team struggled heavily though, benching their jungler Jonathan “Grig” Armao in favor of academy jungler Matthew “Akaadian” Higginbotham.

With both Akaadian and Dardoch now on their active roster, a decision on who the starting jungler will be is expected to come within the next week. Whoever wins the job, the other will be sent down to Academy. Either way, Dignitas will look to improve this split in hopes of making a playoff run.

LGD’s Exciting New Roster

If you’ve been following China’s League of Legends Pro League for a while, then you’re probably aware of LGD’s consistently poor performances in recent years. However, this may be coming to an end, or so their fans hope, with the additions of former RNG top laner Xie “Langx” Zhen-Ying and former Dominus players Ling “Mark” Xu and Su “xiye” Han-Wei.

Before leaving, Langx was a staple for Royal Never Give Up, His performances split after split impressed the RNG faithful, and during his international debut at Worlds 2019, the top laner showed his potential to the world. Now a part of LGD, Langx hopes to translate that potential into star power. Along with Mark and xiye, he’ll be teaming up with jungler Han “Peanut” Wang-ho and bot laner Ha “Kramer” Jong-hun to form LGD’s most exciting starting lineup they’ve had in years.

Team SoloMid Promotes Spica

After the whole Dardoch situation, many were left wondering just who TSM would announce as their starting jungler. The fan favorites turned in-house, deciding to promote Academy jungler Mingyi “Spica” Lu. Spica made his LCS debut with TSM back in Summer 2019, where he notably stole baron against Flyquest in his first ever LCS game. He then stole baron again in his playoff debut later that season against Clutch Gaming.

Now armed with their new jungler and the return of legendary bot laner Doublelift, TSM will look to put this mess of an offseason behind them and challenge the likes of Cloud9 for the summer title.

SK Gaming’s Roster Shake-up

SK Gaming finished as the second-worst team in the League of Legends European Championship this past spring. After winning just four out of their eighteen total games, SK announced some major roster shakeups that they hope will help propel them back into competition among Europe’s finest.

Formerly the mid laner of Berlin Internatioal Gaming of the Prime League Pro Division, Dirk “ZaZee” Mallner recently joined SK as the team’s starting mid laner, switching Janik “Jenax” Bartels to the top lane. The team also brought in twenty-three-year-old Jesse “Jesiz” Le to be the team’s new head coach, who actually played mid lane for SK back in November 2013 to October 2014. Still led by veteran jungler Kim “Trick” Gang-yun, SK hopes their 2020 summer will be vastly different from their 2020 spring.

Ucal and Smeb’s Return to KT Rolster

KT Rolster’s 2020 Spring Split was a breath of fresh air for the franchise, who struggled heavily during 2019’s summer. The team recently finished the split in fifth, after being forced to fight for their LCK roster spot in the 2019 Summer Promotion Tournament. Aiming to get back to their winning ways, KT Rolster resigned Son “Ucal” Woo-hyeon, who was let go by Griffin following their relegation and Song “Smeb” Kyung-ho, who left KT Rolster at the end of last year and remained a free agent.

Ucal and Smeb previously won the LCK title with KT Rolster back in Summer 2018. The two will look to do the same again, as they compete against T1, Gen.G, DragonX, DAMWON, and more for that heavily contested right to call themselves champions of Korea.

Evil Geniuses sign Huni

In Evil Geniuses’ first split back in the LCS, they made waves by signing high profile players in reigning MVP Dennis “Svenskeren” Johnsen, former Team Vitality mid-laner Daniele “Jiizuke” di Mauro and Bae “Bang” Jun-sik, who won two World Championships back when he was a part of SKT T1 in 2015 and 2016. The team also added former Cloud9 youngsters Tristan “Zeyzal” Stidam and Colin “Kumo” Zhao. Despite looking inconstant at times, EG finished the split in 3rd place, losing to Flyquest in the semi-finals.

With the addition of Huni, Evil Geniuses look to bolster their already strong lineup. However, due to Riot Games’ import restrictions, Huni might not play for EG’s LCS roster in 2020. In order to play Huni, Evil Genuises would have to replace Bang with Academy bot laner Matthew “Deftly” Chen. It’s more plausible that fans will see Huni play for EG’s Academy team, and as long as Huni plays at least 50% of the games this summer, he’ll be eligible to declare as a North American citizen for the 2021 Spring Split, and thus be able to play for EG without breaking any import restrictions.

With the 2020 Summer Split set to start in just over two weeks, fans won’t have to wait much longer to see their favorite teams back in action.

Link Source : https://www.thegamer.com/league-of-legends-roster-change-spicadignatas-tsm/