Via Twitter, Immortals recently announced their starting roster for LCS Summer Split 2020: sOAZ, Potluck, Eika, Altec and Gate. This line-up includes three new players, compared to their last starters of Spring Split. Immortals benched Xmithie, Apollo and Hakuho, in favor of Potluck, Altec and Gate.
New Split, who dis?
Here is your IMT Line-Up to kick off week 1 of the LCS Summer Split 😤#WeAreIMT pic.twitter.com/NbZgShUfML
— Immortals (@Immortals) June 10, 2020
General Manager Keaton and Head Coach Zaboutine followed up the announcement with a video going over some of the process that led to this decision. Keaton explained, “Coming into our off-season, we sat down to go over some of the different changes that we needed to make, starting with structural changes, overall philosophy of how we see the roster, and how we approach practice, how we approach reviews from the top down. We headed in three weeks or so before most of the other LCS teams started to scrim, and ran internal sets of mixed rosters between the LCS and Academy. I think we did that for about three weeks or so, until the LCS teams started back up.
Our intent through that was to see the different combinations that we maybe were unable to see in the previous off-season heading into Spring, as we only had two days of practice time. So it allowed us a lot more time to see what fits where, and kind of put together the best formula of what we can make. Once we headed into LCS scrims…we again ran some mixed internals for another couple weeks versus LCS scrims, and came back and decided on our Week 1 roster, understanding where we wanted to go from there heading into the Summer Split.”
Zaboutine put emphasis on the synergy factor when choosing the starters, stating “It’s not about one player specifically being better than the other. It’s ‘Oh, I see this group being cohesive, and I see this Academy group being cohesive at the same time,’ while actually shuffling the rosters. These groups seem to both improve while working together, so why not try this iteration? And it doesn’t mean that even one group is significantly better than the other…The whole thing was more so to identify the human and gameplay synergies we had available to make sure we can use as wide a spectrum of options as we can for this split. This has been the last four and a half weeks of work.”
Keaton goes on to say that this does not mean this roster will be locked in for every week. Immortals will continue to evaluate throughout the split, while figuring out what will be most likely to get them into playoffs and Worlds.
He says this type of roster work will be something Immortals hold onto going into 2021 and beyond, as well.
Image from Immortals’ Twitter
Altec and Gate are not necessarily surprising starters to see over Apollo and Hakuho. Altec is a long-time LCS veteran player, and was Immortals’ intended starter for Spring Split 2020, despite taking 2019 off. Gate has been on LCS and Academy teams almost every split since 2015. Meanwhile, Potluck will be a true rookie player, having only played three splits in Academy.
Week One of the 2020 LCS Summer Split begins June 12th. Immortals will first face FlyQuest and Counter Logic Gaming with the new lineup.
CREDITS
Images from Immortals’ Twitter.
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