...Oof, Clutch. Oof. They're pretty much screwed. Who can they beat in their group? Fnatic? Probably not. SKT? Probably not. Royals Never Give Up? Might be their best chance to win, but I'm not sure that Clutch Gaming can beat even the second seat Chinese team even though that's the team I'd say they stand the greatest chance at winning against.
I'm not sure who to root for in that group tho. I don't really care about RNG, so not them, but I want Fnatic to move on and I want Clutch to move on and I sort-of want SKT to move on, but one of them won't. And that's probably going to be Clutch eliminated. It could even be two of them don't make it. Tho I guess if I had to say, I'm rooting for Clutch and Fnatic even though I think that SKT is probably guaranteed to win (they've already shown they can beat China) which would leave only one slot open that China very well could occupy.
On the other hand, tho: Splyce basically got easymode. Yeah, they've got FPX, the number one Chinese seat to face, and if they are as good as the hype suggests, Splyce might lose to them. (I'm not sure I buy into the Chinese team being that good, hype. I'll believe it when I see it and so far I haven't seen it.) But Splyce shouldn't lose to the other two. So Splyce gets to go through.
On that note, turns out that one of the teams that I wanted to go through would never have gotten through--even if Mammoth did beat Unicorns of Love rather than gamethrowing every step of the way in the final game, they'd still have had to face Splyce and since I was rooting for both teams one (probably Mammoth) would've lost and not moved on. OH WELL. Wasn't relevant anyway due to Mammoth having done precisely that and gamethrew.
When it comes to Group A, G2 are probably the best team in the world--probably. So they probably win. Griffin probably beat C9 here, which is the question to ask; which of C9 or Griffin is the other team to move on because it's kinda a given that HKA get creamed and won't make it.
Then there's group D. I'm actually quite happy about that group to be honest. Damwon Gaming are, probably, strong. They probably win the group. Which leaves the question of whether Invictus or TL move on since there's a nobody in the group who stands no chance and will be creamed. I anti-root for TL as I have said before; I actively want them to lose at every stage. And I think that they don't beat Invictus a second time especially since their victory over Invictus last time...wasn't exactly clean.
There was a prediction in the broadcast: "I don't think NA makes it out of the group stage". That all three of TL, C9, and Clutch are eliminated. Given Clutch is utterly screwed, C9 has a tough time and TL has a tough time...I actually agree. Of the three, C9 probably realistically speaking has the highest chances of pulling it off, though personally, again, I'm rooting for "If any NA team makes it out of group stage, I want it to be Clutch".
I wouldn't be upset at C9 making it because domestically I like Cloud9, albeit not caring about them internationally. (Dunno why, there's just an apathy for them when locally I liked them.) I do think that they have the highest chances, yes. But they're not who I'm really rooting for.
My dream of dream worlds would be:
Clutch and Fnatic move on; Splyce and FPX move on; G2 and Griffon move on; Damwon and Invictus move on.
What I actually think will happen will be:
SKT and 60% Fnatic (40% RNG) move on; Splyce and FPX move on; G2 and 75% Griffon move on; Damwon and Invictus move on.
I really don't think NA is a strong region. While I think that EU is a little bit arrogant and I recognize that they've got a feast-or-famine style where they're fairly aggressive and if they don't dominate they get dominated...push come to shove, they are generally, fairly speaking, good at doing precisely that; dominating. Yeah, their wins are often sloppy; yeah, their wins are often not clean, filled with little errors where you think "this can be exploited", but at the end of the day they still, frequently, deliver. Sure, they don't always deliver.
To put it another way--on a bad day, EU loses to just about almost any team except for maybe NA. On a good day though, I'd say that when they are playing at their best, they can beat any other region playing at their best. That is to say, "EU at its best beats other regions at their bests". The thing about EU is that obviously they're not always at their best, there's whole memes dedicated to the subject showing how they can have off-games or even off-days. So it really will depend, but push come to shove, I think it's more likely that EU will have a good day showing them at their best.
Korea is, if not EU, probably the strongest region in the world. They are ridiculously good. They do make mistakes, plenty of them. But they're in general a lot more "clean" than most other regions are--you make a mistake (and most regions do), and they will punish it. Sure, they are also guilty of sloppy games that aren't as clean as they should be...but in the end of the day, if they're still winning every game they play or almost every game they play, it doesn't matter if they made mistakes that were theoretically exploitable and theoretically game-losing; if they still win, then those mistakes aren't detrimental enough to knock them out. So I think they'll do quite well.
China is my largest question mark. My only metric for their skill level has been based on less than a year's worth of information: I heard during MSI that everyone feared Invictus as being the world champions, thinking they were indomitable. That they are good, that China's a tough region, that they're strong. I've heard "Oh yeah FPX and RNG and Invictus Gaming are all to be feared as DANG good teams".
But what I've seen from them is that Invictus were creamed by TL during MSI, and that all three teams during Rift Rivals East were creamed by Korea. All I've seen from them aside from some of their local games is that while, sure, they crushed the other non-Korean teams at their Rift Rivals...they just get crushed by the other major regions in the world.
Like...they have to be good for people to still call them good in spite of that, but all I've seen from them is them losing so that might be why in my bias I don't really rate them that high. I think they beat NA teams. (Yes, even Invictus beating TL in spite of their last meeting.) I'm less than sure they beat EU teams and they've shown that Korean teams beat them. So they'll do well, but I don't actually think they win?
I guess that in particular would be my hot take. That while the hype behind EU's teams and Korea's teams is justified, the hype behind China's teams...isn't. But like I said, I haven't really seen Chinese teams play much so I'll just have to wait I guess.