League of Legends LXV: What threads are mine to make, little Lamb? All, dear Wolf.

[Joran]

Y'know, with all this talk about CLG being idiots to have gotten rid of Doublelift, something occurs to me:

In all these years, through all the roster changes, dramatic interpersonal explosions, epic late-season collapses, and "Golden Ages" that turned to bronze-at-best, the only real constant has been Doublelift playing AD Carry. Pretty much everything else - roster, player positions, management, coaches, everything - has changed around him in some way.

As the saying goes, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing and expecting different results. CLG has spent four years changing anything and everything except Doublelift over and over and over, and they've gotten more or less the same result every time: do good, collapse, roster-splode in a torrent of "I hate playing with Doublelift" tweets, rinse, repeat. Maybe they figured they'd try changing Doublelift for once and see what happens.

*shrug* Just a thought.


...although knowing my track record, ten'll get ya twenty that I'm totally wrong and just making myself look like an idiot yet again.

The one key thing that most CLG fans are mentioning is that this year the result was different. CLG had their patented tailspin in the middle of the season, but managed to right the ship and finished strong. Then they went on a tear through the playoffs, again, not choking, and won the NA LCS championship in convincing fashion. They no showed at Worlds, but at least they made Worlds this year.

Then in the offseason, CLG fired the coach, and released both Pobelter and Doublelift, after the strongest year CLG has ever had in the LCS era. It could absolutely be the right move, I've also read the negative things about Doublelift, but the proof is going to be if CLG can build something.

If it goes wrong... oh boy.

P.S. I think it's the right move for CLG too. At this point, there's too much baggage with Doublelift and both parties could use a fresh start. It's probably great for Doublelift to be put on a team where he isn't the alpha dog, but again, we'll see if TSM's bet pays off. In the short term, it has to be good for their brand.