Golden Guardians Support Olleh Calls out LCS Players for Neglecting Champions Queue
Star Golden Guardians support Kim “Olleh” Joo-sung has criticized the majority of LCS players for not prioritizing Champions Queue games in the North American League of Legends (LoL) lobby. In a recent Twitch rant on March 15, Olleh questioned why more pros aren’t actively participating in Champions Queue.
The issue, according to Olleh, is that the number of players in Champions Queue has significantly decreased since the invite-only LoL lobbies were introduced in February. Initially, there was considerable interest, but as the competition intensified and the prizes, which include $12,000 per split and $25,000 per season became harder to attain, many LCS pros stopped playing altogether. This downward trend has continued in recent weeks.
At the end of the first split of the closed League queue, which concluded on March 8, Olleh revealed that there were barely 20 to 30 players actively participating, and they were mostly the same individuals.
The Purpose of Champions Queue and the Lack of Passion
Champions Queue was established by Riot Games earlier this year to provide high-stakes practice games for North American LoL pros and high-Elo players. It offers cash prizes totaling $400,000 throughout the year. Olleh argues that while the cash prize is a nice bonus, LCS professionals should be playing in the top League of Legends competition just for the sake of improvement and practice. Without the passion and dedication from the players, Champions Queue cannot fulfill its purpose.
The support player calls upon the LCS players to prioritize practice and dedicate more time to the game. Olleh mentions that in Korea, working hard and grinding is considered normal, which has contributed to the success of the Korean League of Legends Championship (LCK). He finds it strange that the same level of commitment is not seen among North American players.
Olleh’s Performance in the First Champions Queue Split
In the first split of Champions Queue, Olleh finished in second place. He accumulated 800LP and received a prize of $8,000 for his efforts. Jojopyun from Evil Geniuses secured first place by maintaining a 63 percent win rate in over 200 games, earning $12,000 in the process.
Split two of Champions Queue has already started, with Cloud9 Academy jungler Malice and Team Liquid’s CoreJJ currently leading the invite-only League server with 105LP each.
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