The regular seasons in the 2023 League of Legends Spring Splits across the globe are coming to an end. The LCS and LCK have already locked in their playoff contenders, while the LEC and LPL brackets will be determined in the upcoming weeks.
Since the start of the first matches in January, the balance team at Riot Games has pushed out several patches, warping the meta heavily from where we began. We saw the rise and fall of most ranged supports, hypercarries slowly making a return following the ADC item buffs, as well as the switch from tank junglers like Sejuani to more aggressive options like Gragas or Lee Sin.
Despite the great variety of champions picked this spring, there are still 36 unique champions that haven’t stepped onto Summoner’s Rift across the four major regions—and many of them only have a couple (or just one) games played.
With squads getting ready for the most important phase of the first half of the season, here are some of the champion picks that are going to be on teams’ radars during the 2023 Spring Split playoffs.
Twisted Fate
Twisted Fate has always been a peculiar pick for professional play. Regardless of the meta and his power compared to other mid lane champions, he’s always able to sneak in a few games across the splits.
In 2023, Twisted Fate has made a total of eight appearances across the LEC, LPL, and LCK, according to stats site Games of Legends, with an impressive 77.8 percent win rate (seven wins out of nine games in total).
Even though he hasn’t been a priority over the last few months, teams decide to pick Twisted Fate when they want to have strong map presence and set up for ganks and dives in the side lanes. Unlike other champions, he’s not a carry champ that wants to get resources. Instead, he’s the one that enables other players on his own team.
The latest game that featured Twisted Fate was the game between KOI and Fnatic, played by KOI’s mid laner Larssen. Going up against Azir, Larssen out-roamed him around the map. That said, Twisted Fate was unable to snowball his teammates because KOI ended up taking bad fights and getting caught several times. Nonetheless, he was able to exert a strong map presence in the early-mid game.
With hypercarries coming back in the meta, teams might be willing to pick Twisted Fate to help snowball the bot lane. When Jinx and Aphelios were considered S-tier last season, Twisted Fate was a common pick during the playoffs, with more than 20 games played. Even though he’s not a top-tier champ right now, TF might be the key in specific matches in the near future.
Pantheon
Pantheon is one of the 36 unique champions that hasn’t been picked among the major regions so far, but that might not be the case by the time we get to the playoffs. The Unbreakable Spear got some intriguing buffs in Patch 13.5 that have the potential to push him onto the priority list among professional teams by the time the playoffs begin.
Aside from his strong early game, easy gank setups (Flash plus W combo), and map presence thanks to his ultimate Grand Starfall, the main and most important reason why he might be a contested pick is his flexibility within the draft.
Given that Pantheon can be played across three different roles (top, jungle, and mid), he gains a lot of value when you’re looking to blind-pick champions, especially on the blue side.
While there are some regions that have already played him on past patches, according to Games of Legends, no one among the major regions has yet played him in the 2023 Spring Split. We’ll have to see whether the Patch 13.5 buffs are good enough to push him into the meta and whether he will become a pick-or-ban status champ. Regardless of how teams regard him going forward, Pantheon is almost guaranteed to be present in the playoffs.
Hecarim
We’re only three months into the season but the jungle meta has undergone a few important and influential meta shifts.
Now that junglers deal bonus damage to enemy camps as well, we’re finally starting to see power-farming champions making a comeback. Among the most notorious farming junglers, there is Hecarim, who completely went under the radar since the start of the season. That said, he might be one of those spicy picks to pull out in decisive matches during the playoffs.
Not only does he benefit from the jungle changes but he’s one of the few champions that can go different builds depending on the team composition. Hecarim can go with a full glass cannon build to kill squishy targets or go a more balanced route to become a bruiser-like champion.
If teams are picking immobile carries in the playoffs, Hecarim might be the right candidate to punish them.
Senna
We’ve already seen Senna being picked prior to the end of the LCK regular season by T1: Keria picked it in tandem with Cho’Gath against DRX.
The pairing worked wonderfully, which might inspire others to pick the duo. That said, Senna is not solely linked to Cho’Gath: there are many other champions that can be played with her, like Seraphine, Karthus, and Veigar.
Given that the bot lane meta is reverting back to scaling picks as opposed to bully laners, there is space for Senna to thrive in such an environment. She will remain as a situational pick, but make sure to keep an eye out for her, especially in the LCK.
Ezreal Mid
This is probably the No. 1 pick that we are hoping to see during the LCK Spring Split playoffs. ShowMaker has been trying out Ezreal in solo queue as a mid laner, with an innovative and unconventional build that featured Moonstone as the Mythic item. He has been trying out new variations of it, which means that it’s not just a random idea.
It will be up to him and Dplus KIA to prove that the pick can be effective in professional play. Considering Deft’s signature pick is Ezreal, there is a chance that the team tries to flex the champion between the two.
Whether it works or not will be a big question mark, but it would definitely be exciting to see Ezreal mid in action somewhere down the line.
Maokai (with Moonstone Renewer)
While Maokai has been a strong presence from the beginning of season 13, there has been a new build popping up for him in the last few weeks in solo queue.
Considering that the Demonic Embrace-Radiant Virtue combo got nerfed over the last few patches, the chances of seeing the new Moonstone Renewer build in the playoffs are going to be a lot higher. LNG Esports’ jungler Tarzan already played it over in the LPL, winning the decisive game in the series against Invictus Gaming. The power of the new build lies in its low-cost, high-value items like Moonstone Renewer and Redemption. The two basically provide the same, if not more, healing than the former build with Radiant Virtue.
It shouldn’t be a surprise to see Maokai picked by teams, but this build will be one to look out for.
League fans should start getting ready to see more of these picks in the upcoming weeks when the Spring Split playoffs will kick off worldwide, starting with the LCK Spring Playoffs on March 22.
