IEM Katowice Major Legends Stage Pick’Em Predictions
This is it, guys! IEM Katowice Challengers Stage is all wrapped up, and your Pick’Em Challenge campaign started off on the right foot. Honestly, my initial picks weren’t exactly the best ones, but I’ve still managed to get seven out of nine right. Enough to get the first round of picks for my coin upgrade. As for the IEM Katowice Legends Stage Pick’Em Predictions, let’s make sure we all continue our winning ways!
That said, allow me to be your guide through the next stage of IEM Katowice Pick’Em Challenge. Throughout the next couple of paragraphs, I’ll do my best to express my opinions and explain why I believe my predictions will turn out to be correct. So, without any further ado, let’s kick things off with the trickiest picks, 3-0 and 0-3 scores!
IEM Katowice Legends Stage Pick’Em Predictions | 3-0 and 0-3 Spots
Starting off our IEM Katowice Legends Stage Pick’Em Predictions, we’ll first choose the most superior and most inferior teams out there. Some of you might be surprised by my picks. Some of you might be outright enraged by them. But, if you want to have a chance at keeping your Pick’Em record in the green, do yourself some justice and at least hear me out before you ring your “I call bullshit” bell.
How to Upgrade Your IEM Katowice Coin?
With all that in mind, here are my thoughts on the 3-0 and 0-3 spots.
First up, I’ll put FaZe Clan as my 3-0 spot. Now, now, I know most of you will call me crazy for picking one of the least consistent teams to go through without a single loss. But at least hear me out, will you? I am well aware of the fact Astralis, Team Liquid, and even MIBR are more likely to go through without a single loss than FaZe Clan. So why am I sticking with the EU superstar team? Well, in all honesty, I’m going with them because I believe they’ll either dominate the opposition or end up being a huge flop.
Ideally, you want to have the safest picks down in the list below. Even though it’s logical to put Astralis or Team Liquid at the 3-0 spot, chances are they might end up on the losing end of a Bo1 upset and still go through. If this happens, your Pick’Em predictions will greatly suffer. Not only will you miss the 3-0 spot but you’ll also miss one of the seven advancing spots below. That said, I’m going with FaZe since they haven’t been at their best form recently which means they might not even go through… but knowing their superstar roster, they definitely have the quality to snowball to a 3-0 score.
Going with this logic, another viable 3-0 spot here would be Natus Vincere. They haven’t had a proper boot camp ahead of this tournament which could mean their teamwork and executions might suffer. But then again, S1mple is a God among men, and he could easily lead his team to a 3-0 massacre if everything goes his way.
On the other hand, choosing the 0-3 picks is a much more lenient task. In my opinion, there are three teams that have the slimmest chances of causing a Bo1 upset. compLexity, HellRaisers, and Cloud9. Personally, I’ve gone with compLexity as their track record in recent months is outright awful.
IEM Katowice Legends Stage Pick’Em Predictions | Who Will Advance?
Now we’ve reached the main section of the IEM Katowice Legends Stage Pick’Em Predictions. Of course, I am referring to those seven spots below the 3-0 and 0-3 picks. These are the bread and butter of your picks, the choices that can either make or break your entire Challenge.
That said, you need to approach this section with a bit of caution and take up more of an unconventional approach. No worries, I’ll explain everything in due time. For now, let’s focus on the safest picks you should lock in right away!
Safest Picks
Obviously, the safest picks for IEM Katowice Legends Stage Pick’Em Predictions should be the heavy favorites. I’ve already explained why you shouldn’t put the likes of Astralis, Team Liquid, and MIBR in the 3-0 spot so there’s no point repeating it here.
Basically, the first four picks for advancing teams should be as follows – Astralis, Team Liquid, MIBR, and NaVi. Depending on your personal preferences, you can go with FaZe instead of NaVi. In other words, you can pick NaVi for the 3-0 spot since they’re in somewhat of a similar situation like FaZe. As for the other three teams, there are no doubts in my mind that they’ll go through to the Champions Stage. We’re talking about the three most dominant CS:GO teams at the moment. Teams that shouldn’t have issues securing three wins against the opposition. Do yourself a favor and lock these in right off the bat!
Less Probable Picks
And now let’s focus on the less probable picks that you have to make in order to get that shiny IEM Katowice coin upgrade. In addition to those four “safe” picks, you will also have to add three more to finish off with your IEM Katowice Legends Stage Pick’Em Predictions. After locking down Astralis, Team Liquid, MIBR, and NaVi, let’s see which teams you have left to choose.
Obviously, the first name out of the remaining teams is definitely NRG. True, their path to the Legends Stage was a lengthy one. However, they’ve shown off brilliant performance match in and match out, having a proper walk in the park through both the Minor tournament and the Challengers Stage. In fact, now that I think of it, I should’ve picked NRG together with the safest picks since they seem to be at the top of their game at the moment.
Now that we got NRG out of the way, we still need two more teams to lock down. Let’s do some elimination first before nailing down our final picks. First up, I’d like to point out why I feel G2 won’t be going through to the final stage of IEM Katowice. Their Challengers Stage performance was meh, to say the least. They’ve lost against ENCE and AVANGAR (both on Overpass though, so take that with a grain of salt) and have struggled against Tyloo in the decider match. True, they’ve defeated Fnatic, but that’s not that big of an accomplishment considering how poorly Fnatic has played throughout the tournament. Overall, their gameplay was too static. They’ve made a ton of technical mistakes in their five Challengers Stage matches, mistakes that’ll definitely end up costing them the place in the Champions Stage.
Talking about ENCE and AVANGAR, I honestly can’t see them making an upset against tougher opponents. The stakes are much higher at this phase of the competition, and I believe neither of these teams has the firepower to cause upsets. Need I remind you, in order to qualify for the Champions Stage all teams must win at least one Bo3 match against some of the best teams out there… and neither ENCE or AVANGAR have what it takes to do that. Sure, they might cause an upset on Bo1’s, but come the crucial Bo3 matchups, I guarantee their lack of individual quality will show. The same can be said for Renegades and Team vitality too.
So what are we left with here? Well, BIG and Ninjas in Pyjamas seem like the most likely options here. Cloud9 has the individual quality too, but their roster isn’t playing the way it was supposed to be organized, and that’s something that’ll definitely show in the crucial Bo3 matches. That said, I’ll put my picks where my mouth is and go with NRG, BIG (even though Smooya is out), and NiP.
IEM Katowice Legends Stage Pick’Em Predictions | Final Overview
At last, here’s how my actual Pick’Em looks like. As you can see, I’ve got FaZe at the 3-0 spot due to their huge performance oscillations. Once again, I strongly believe they will either dominate or be dominated during the Legends Stage. Obviously, teams like Astralis and Team Liquid are more likely to get the 3-0 score in the end, but if you want to play things safe and get that shiny coin upgrade in the end, then placing the safest picks down below is the way to go. On a side note, you can try switching FaZe Clan with NaVi. That’s also a viable team composition and perhaps even slightly better than my initial recommendation. Do it at your own risk though, we all know S1mple can be both a game maker and breaker.
Finally, my 0-3 pick is compLexity. In all honesty, this spot was a dead race between compLexity, Cloud9, and HellRaisers. However, compLexity took the “throne” in my books although you can’t go wrong with choosing either HR or C9. Let’s be realistic here, they all have equal chances of making a proper mess.
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