In a surprising decision, Immortals has decided to start off the first week of the 2020 LCS Summer Split without their veteran jungler, Xmithie. Instead, the roster will feature Nicholas “Potluck” Pollock in the starting lineup.
Potluck will be joining Paul “sOAZ” Boyer, Jérémy “Eika” Valdenaire, Johnny “Altec” Ru, and Austin “Gate” Yu in a move that confused many fans and analysts for the North American scene.
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
Over the past few years, Xmithie has been one of the most consistent junglers in the LCS. His great decision making, leadership skills, and ability to work around his team have made him one of NA’s finest talents—when he was a free agent at the end of 2019, he was one of the most sought-after players on the market.
Immortals GM Keaton Cryer and head coach Thomas “Zaboutine” Si-Hassen spoke about the decision in a recent video, and said that the goal is to try out all available synergies that the team has with their 10-man roster. As a result, this isn’t going to be the lineup we will see every weekend.
It will be interesting to see how often Xmithie, AD carry Apollo Price, and support Nickolas “Hakuho” Surgent will come in and out of the roster. They still have plenty of talent to provide this team, should they start to falter early in the season.
It makes sense that the management would make a change for the summer, since the team finished in eighth place during the spring. We will need to see if these roster decisions will come back to bite them as the regular season continues forward. Immortals’ hopes of qualifying for the 2020 LCS Spring Split playoffs were dashed t after losing to a surging Team Dignitas squad.
This was surely a disappointing finish for Immortals, but there’s still plenty of room to grow for the current season. The team’s veteran jungler, Xmithie, who missed the LCS playoffs for the first time since his days on XDG in 2014 will have to prove himself in Academy first before being promoted back to the main LCS roster.
Will Immortals be able to achieve some glory or will they maintain mediocrity over the entire Summer Split and look to rebuild for the next year if stuff doesn’t work out? The players themselves might have some individual good performance, but their teamwork is lackluster.
They need to find a strong point and stick to it in order to be able to contest top tier teams.
