Zaqueri “aphromoo” Black is really good at the game of League of Legends.
It feels like a repetitive statement. Yet every year, we have to remind ourselves that he’s arguably the greatest support to ever play in North America, given his ability to constantly perform over such a long period of time. His in-game leadership and mechanical prowess continues to surprise. Even with a world champion and another talented individual making their claim to the crown with their incredible performances in recent splits, Aphromoo isn’t letting go of the all-time crown just yet.
In the opening week of the LCS 2022 Spring, FlyQuest exited with a 2-0 record with an average game-time of 41.5 minutes — longest in the league. Using a roaming smite top laner in both of their matches, FlyQuest didn’t necessarily capitalize on the early advantage. In fact, both Golden Guardians and Counter Logic Gaming were able to react to the playstyle and not let the “cheese” overtake the game.
Counter Logic Gaming’s bottom lane played as well as they could have against the abhorrent amount of pressure in the laning phase while Thomas “Jenkins” Tran began to take advantage of the alone time and heavily pushed. Golden Guardians did their best to avoid FlyQuest’s willingness to 5v5 team fight and countered the map pressure beautifully, putting the team in the driver’s position only to throw away the game with late game errors.
Yet it was the playmaking and the decision-making from FlyQuest that made the difference.
In the previous season, FlyQuest looked to be without a general direction of how to play. There were serious concerns with the performance of their new face of the franchise, Brandon “Josedeodo” Villegas. In a way, he was a shell of the self he presented at Worlds 2020. He wasn’t this aggressive player or this great playmaker. He ranked third to last among starting junglers in total number of kills participated in per game in the spring split (8) and dead last in the summer split (7.1). His first blood percentage also wasn’t impressive — 28% in the spring, 39% in the summer.
The coaching staff never really found a sustainable strategy for the team. The lack of cohesion would lead to embarrassing defeats — including a perfect game loss to Cloud9 in week two of the summer split. The team was simply steamrolled from start to finish, showing no signs of life.
This current FlyQuest is a much different story.
This team secured the second-most kills in the opening week (36). Four members of the team ranked in the top six when it comes to total number of kills involved in — with Loïc “toucouille” Dubois being the odd man out. Although, it is understandable given his usage.
FlyQuest are playing the map as a team from start to finish. In theory, it should make the game easier yet execution can be complicated. Especially with a jungler that displayed hesitancy problems last season, the team needed confidence and commitment from team members. By pairing Josedeodo with his top laner and support for almost all of the game — both ranked first and second in jungler proximity statistics — Josedeodo was looking more comfortable.
But this wasn’t a perfect week for the team. Against Counter Logic Gaming, FlyQuest found themselves in an awkward position at 34 minutes. Because CLG were countering FlyQuest’s map movement, they continued to have excellent pressure on FlyQuest’s base. If it wasn’t for an Aphromoo flash-ultimate combo that was unable to be countered as CLG pushed in, that game could have had a different outcome. Aphromoo’s performance in the team fight at 38 minutes would also be critical, making Jenkins’ life miserable. In the final moments of the game, Counter Logic Gaming did an excellent job at setting the battle line for FlyQuest to have to cross. Yet FlyQuest would pull out a beautiful chain of abilities onto Trundle that gave them the critical pick to open the bottom lane and almost finish the game.
Against Golden Guardians, better team-fight management would come into play again. After securing a baron, Golden Guardians looked to be on their way out. Yet would punish the positioning and hesitancy of GGS. The clear highlight moment was Josedeodo’s kick onto Corki. Yet it would be the early zoning done by FlyQuest that make the fight so favorable for them. In the final fight of the game, that would feature a Josedeodo steal, it was FlyQuest getting the package out early that would set the tone. But the peel that would be completed for Johnsun — a common theme in teamfights this game, was incredible.
There’s clearly a reason why Johnson “Johnsun” Nguyen likes working with Aphromoo. He would output the most damage per minute among marksmen, record two deaths on the weekend while being involved with 86.1% of his team’s kills.
…
Aphromoo is the Chris Paul of the LCS. There’s a beauty to his game that cannot be explained, only appreciated. He understands the game so fluently. His mechanics, his decision-making truly feel unmatched. He does so much in the game that sometimes doesn’t get recorded on the stat sheet.
The early, early season progress from Josedeodo and Johnsun paints the picture that there is something different to this line-up. Historically, Johnsun has been one of the better marksman, simply unable to showcase his talents last season due to a crumbling FlyQuest core. But Josedeodo is finally showcasing the moxie and presence that made him such a valuable prospect.
Given how early it is in the season, it is tough to gauge or predict what the future of FlyQuest will look like. Strategically speaking, they can’t keep getting away with the smite top laner strategy. We also won’t know how good their opponents were — especially with analysts predicting GGS and CLG to be towards the bottom of the standings.
But there are still a ton of promising things to this team. The presence of Aphromoo clearly has struck a cord with this line-up. Its providing validation into investing into early game set pieces. The team looks to be in cohesion when it comes to team fighting. And they can fight their way back into the games.
In the Lock-In tournament — where it is now evident they were hiding strategies and testing, we still saw a similar style of team map movement. It isn’t going to be a style of play that is limited to the smite support top laner strategy. Instead, it will be an evolving system.
And hopefully this is another stop in the road where Aphromoo can earn his roses. His time with Dignitas didn’t necessarily end on the highest note. He not only continues to grow his game, he grows the game of the talent around him. We don’t know where or when the end of his career is coming, but it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be appreciating these moments.
If you’re FlyQuest, you’re certainly counting your blessings.
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