The New Cloud 9

Cloud 9 had a pretty poor season last year and even though they fought in the gauntlet and made it to worlds it was not the same Cloud 9. Now Cloud 9 has added two new members to their squad with Rush and BunnyFuFu while LemonNation moves to the coaching role. Overall this is a good move for Cloud 9 because they are acquiring young mechanically skilled players while at the same time keeping Lemon and his notebook who’s game knowledge is second to none.

Now let’s look at the current roster of Cloud 9

Coach: Lemon

Top: Balls

Jungle: Rush

Mid: Incarnation

Adc: Sneaky

Support: Bunnyfufu/Hai

       This current roster looks really good on paper and what I like about this roster is that they are still trying to include older members such as Hai and Lemon but at the same time keeping Balls is sort of questionable. Hai is well known for his shotcalling abilities, his leadership, and his ability to be creative with his plays when his back is against the wall and his abilities shined in the gauntlet. Hai going to support is good for the team because he is given the same playmaking abilities as a jungler but on a less mechanically skilled role. While Hai’s counterpart BunnyFuFu is a mechanically skilled player who is known for his thresh, braum, and morgana but he is still learning the ropes when it comes to shotcalling. This is a great recipe that Cloud 9 has created because now they have a relationship where they are both learning off each other but the most important part is that it is giving BunnyFuFu the right tools to become the godlike support he was hyped up to be.

          Another great move by Cloud 9 is the addition of Rush. Everybody knows Rush for being the manliest jungler in NA LCS but the fact that he is still a young player still stands. By having Rush in the squad one might think that Cloud 9 would have to change their own play style to suit rush, while that may have worked on TIP this will not work on Cloud 9 because the other players don’t really fit the manly playstyle that rush has create. Looking at it in that perspective, adding Rush sounds like a bad move but it is not because they have one of the greatest shotcallers in League of Legends history in Hai. In TIP it really did feel like Rush was just fighting for the sake of fighting and then they would eventually just fall off mid to late game due to poor shotcalling. Rush is now in a team with great shotcallers such as BunnyFuFu and Hai. Aggression is good but controlled aggression is even better, If Cloud 9 are able to tame Rush and mold him into a smart aggressive jungler, Rush might become one of the best junglers in NA LCS.

       Adding these two players have now opened up paths for their carry roles to do well. Sneaky and Incarnation can become one of the scariest duo damage threats NA can produce. Incarnation has proven himself that he can play with the big boys it’s just that he is a little bit of a late bloomer. He also had Hai as a jungler who was very unfamiliar with the position leading Incarnation to hold play passively in the early game because Hai had horrible jungle pathing. Rush can allow Incarnation to play at his best. Sneaky on the other hand doesn’t have to carry every game now because Cloud 9 now has a carry jungler and a support that who is mechanically good enough to make clutch plays on his own.

   The last and maybe the best move that Cloud 9 did was moving LemonNation to the coaching role. LemonNation is one of the smartest guys when it comes to NA LCS but it was very clear that he was just not that strong mechanically. LemonNation would often fail flashes, get caught for no reason, and miss skill shots all the time but Cloud 9 could not let him go because he had a lot of game knowledge. Moving LemonNation to the Coaching role makes it so that Lemon is now contributing to the best he can by providing tools for the young bloods of Cloud 9.