The third Minor/Major pair is over, and
four teams are locked to attend The International 9 (VP, Secret, EG,
Vici), with another two or three all but certain (Fnatic, LGD, and
Ninjas in Pyjamas). Top teams with questionable berths are starting
to panic, including last years TI winners, OG.
Below, readers will find my current evaluation of the top 20 teams,
plus additional teams who participated in either the recent
DreamLeague
Season 11 Major or StarLadder
ImbaTV Dota 2 Minor. The number in brackets indicates the change
in ranking since the end of the The
Chongqing Major. Teams in Red participated in the Major, Blue in
the Minor, and Black failed to qualify for either. An * indicates
the team has secured a spot at the International.
Top Tier:
1.
Virtus Pro* (+1) 2nd
Place
2.
Team Secret* (-1) 4th
Place
3.
Vici Gaming* (+3) 1st
Place
Lower Top Tier:
4.
LGD (-1)
5.
Fnatic (0) 3rd
Place
6.
Evil Geniuses* (-2)
Upper Middle
Tier:
7. Team
Liquid (0)
8. EHOME (0)
9. Ninjas in
Pyjamas (+6)
10. Keen
Gaming (+8)
11. Forward
Gaming (-2)
Lower Middle Tier:
12. Gambit (+1)
13. Aster (-1)
14. Mineski New
Entry
15. J.
Storm (+1)
Bottom Tier:
16. OG (-6)
17. NAVI New
Entry
18. Chaos (-1)
19. Flying
Penguins New Entry
20. Royal Never
Give Up New Entry
Additional Participants in the Major
or Minor
21. Old But Gold
23. Demolition
24. Boom ID
31. Infamous
Off the top 20:
TNC
Alliance
The Pango
Tigers
For comparison, here is a picture of
the Dota Pro Circuit Points as of 3/27/2019. Also, a link to the
page.
Reviewing the numbers, the biggest
winner of the last two months was Vici Gaming: a Major Winner, a lock
for the International, the only team to defeat both Secret and Virtus
Pro, and gaining 3 spots in the rankings. Other winners include
Fnatic, with their first top three finish, along with Ninjas and Keen
who rose considerably in the rankings. Mineski finally made it into
the top 20, with a leap that landed them in 14th place.
The biggest losers were EHOME and
Liquid, both of whom failed to earn a spot in the upper bracket, and
promptly lost their best of one(s) to 31st place Infamous,
and 18th place Chaos respectively. The only good news for
them: they both were able to scrape a victory against a reasonable
opponent, and then flopped out in a best of one, which my model
doesn't penalize as much as losing a best of three. Readers will
notice they didn't even drop in the rankings, but this is mostly
attributable to how much of a buffer they had prior to entering the
Major stage. Other teams weren't so lucky. OG earned only a 5th/6th
place finish in the Minor, losing to brand new stacks like Old
But Gold and Flying Penguins. TNC failed entirely to even get to the
SEA Regional Qualifier for the Minor, losing to Team Admiral in a
best of 1 in the SEA Minor Open Qualifiers! This was
after finishing 5th/6th at the Kuala Lumpur
Major, and ranking 11th in my system after a 9th-12th
finish at the Chongqing Major.
In the few days since the Major's
conclusion, a number of teams have already announced roster
adjustments. The biggest news: OG has convinced Ana to return out of
his temporary retirement. Will the reunited TI 8 winning roster rise
to new heights? I doubt it, having believed their Championship was a
lucky Cinderella story, but then again, I doubted them during their
TI8 run, and they won. Maybe Ana is all OG needs to be a top team
again. Other changes are as follows. Three players left Forward
Gaming's roster, most likely demolishing their chance of reaching
TI9. Universe is searching for a new team, SVG retired, and
Resolut1n is taking a break of indeterminate length. Expect the new
Forward to drop in the rankings. A newly resurgent Mineski, who
finally achieved something noteworthy, is losing supports Febby and
Pieliedie for Filipino duo Bimbo and ninjaboogie. Last but not
least, is the disbandment of Eternal Envy's newly created team Flying
Penguins. Without any insight, this seems surprising. Within a
month of forming they almost qualified for the Major, earned a
3rd/4th place finish at the Minor, and ranked
19th on my system. Such quick success seems worthy of
further experimentation, but EE has already indicated he is searching
for a new team.
The last thoughts are about the
structure of the Major/Minor system. There will never be a perfect
system, but there are still flaws. They could be corrected.
For the upcoming Major, the organizer
is forced to allocate 2 spots for each of the six regions (NA, SA,
EU, CIS, China, SEA), and allowed to divvy out three more. Instead
of trying to decide which region is most worthy (China, EU, NA), they
should award automatic spots to the top three finalists of the
Dreamleague Major; Vici, Virtus Pro, and Fnatic.
The more significant issue is the
mandated 2 spots. After three Major/Minors, no South American Team
has achieved better than a 9th-12th place finish at a
Major (and none have won a Minor). Meanwhile, EU has one 1st,
one 2nd, and two 4ths , CIS has one 1st,
and two 2nd, China has a 1st and 4th,
NA owns two 3rd, and SEA is on the board with a 3rd.
In spite of their continual failure,
the South American team, Chaos, is 13th in Dota Pro
Circuit Points. The 12 teams with the most DPC will be automatically
invited to The International 9. Yet, there are at least three teams
my system believes are superior to Chaos. (Original Roster) Forward
Gaming is only 16th in DPC, while Gambit is 15th,
and Aster is 19th. Yet they have fewer points because
their regions are tougher. Particularly representative, is the fact
that the South American teams with the 2nd most DPC is
Thunder Predator, ranking 18th in DPC, but around 50th
(!) on my system. They have no shot at making it on DPC, but the
fact that they are also have more points than Aster is absurd. If
one looks at my rankings, they can also see the 2nd South
American team at the Major was Infamous, ranking 31st.
They were able to attend, while other teams like Gambit, Aster, OG,
Flying Penguins, and Royal NGU had to either attend the Minor, or no
event at all. Of course, Infamous is now 21st in DPC,
near or above all the teams mentioned.
I have nothing against South America,
but the results indicate the unfairness of awarding them a second
spot at each Major while better teams from more difficult regions
languish.
The
Regional Qualifiers for the upcoming Major MDL Disneyland® Paris
Major begins tomorrow. Enjoy the competition.
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