Will Evil Geniuses succeed at rebuilding their roster with only one player remaining from the title-winning team?
No team in the recent history of the LCS exploded as spectacularly or as suddenly as this Evil Geniuses roster. At the end of April last year, Evil Geniuses had just won their first LCS trophy in the organization’s history. Now just a year later, only one player remains from that roster that was supposed to become the newest dynasty in the region.
The sudden change of direction seemed to be due to the economic struggles of the organization in the current environment, and it was rumored that the only reason Joseph Joon “jojopyun” Pyun stayed on the team was due to his minimum rookie contract. So, there was a decent amount of worry among the EG fans online about how the team’s future would look like, along with a decent backlash toward how the organization handled its LCS operations.
We heard y’all are feelin a little emo about what happened to our #LCS roster…
Hear the story in a new EG Files on 5.30 pic.twitter.com/JVxyYJleLi
— Evil Geniuses (@EvilGeniuses) May 26, 2023
Evil Geniuses LCS Roster for the 2023 Summer
- Top lane: Mo “Revenge” Kaddoura
- Jungle: Jonathan “Armao” Armao
- Mid lane: Joseph Joon “jojopyun” Pyun
- AD Carry: William “UNF0RGIVEN” Nieminen
- Support: Bill “Eyla” Nguyen
With the amount of talent Evil Geniuses lost this offseason, it would be very hard to argue that they can stay as a title challenger or a top-of-the-table team. But, the new roster they were able to put together still exceeds expectations and can surprise a lot of people if everything goes right.
Starting with Jojopyun, every LCS fan is aware of his slump during the Spring Split. The young player even tweeted when EG’s split ended that he didn’t play to his standards, and would be returning with a vengeance. And he is kind of doing it. During his offseason bootcamp in Korea, Jojo has been on an absolute tear, hitting rank six on the latter in less than a month. We know Jojo can be one of the best mid laners in LCS if he is in form, and it looks like he will get there for the 2023 LCS Summer.
played like ass this was a wake up call see u in summer
— Jojopyun (@jojopyunlol) April 1, 2023
Then there is UNF0RGIVEN. The Swedish bot laner shocked everyone last split when he joined 100 Thieves Challengers as he was selected 1st Team All-Pro in LEC just the previous split. Many thought 100T brought him in just in case Doublelift’s return did not work out, and he ended up spending one split in the NACL. During his time with 100T Challengers, UNF0RGIVEN was no doubt the best ADC in NACL, and it was obvious he did not belong at that level. He can easily be a top-five ADC in LCS, if Eyla can bounce back from an underwhelming split and the duo finds good synergy.
Of course that’s a big if, and Eyla isn’t the only player who had a down Spring. Revenge also struggled a lot in his last split with Immortals, despite being considered one of the rare positives for the org during their bottom-two finish streak. Both Eyla and Revenge come with decent potential, but their 2023 performance so far won’t cut it if EG aims to make noise during playoffs.
It won’t help that the final piece of the roster, Armao, is coming out of a coaching stint. He is also not a stranger to the LCS stage, having previously played on TL, Dignitas and TSM without much success. Although he found himself a resurgence in the Team Liquid Academy team. Toward the end of his time with TL Academy, Armao was clearly the best jungler in the Proving Grounds circuit, so he earned himself a fair shot at an LCS spot.
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