Full-time: Starting from Ye Xiu vs. Faker

Chapter 416: The ranking of those who fanned the flames

As soon as the words "player ranking" were released, a visible smell of gunpowder permeated the air.

As we all know, wherever someone tries to rank the contestants, the spectators will automatically fight for the ranking.

Especially when a league is still in its early stages of development and the sample size is far from enough,
Anyone who dares to rashly come up with a ranking should be careful that his or her household registration booklet may be criticized by netizens and only have one page left.

There is no need for a specific ranking. As long as someone dares to publicly make outrageous remarks such as "XX is the world's number one XXX" on a certain platform, it will be enough to cause a huge uproar.

Tencent Esports officials are obviously well aware of this, so they always pay attention to their wording when promoting their products.

From the start of the LPL to the present, Tencent Esports' official media has never clearly analyzed the strength of the relationship between players in any form on any platform.

Even the strength of the teams will be expressed as euphemistically as possible.

So far, all the fancy rankings circulating in LPL, such as "Four Top Lanes" and "Three Top Mid Lanes", all come from fan gathering places such as Single Kill Bar, and the official has never spread these controversial memes in any form.

Although black and red are still red, and provoking conflict is still provoking, it is obvious that the official Tencent Esports does not think highly of this controversial traffic.

However, just because the official doesn’t want it doesn’t mean others don’t want it either.

Especially those latecomers who entered the market late and missed the era of land grabbing.

ESPN is the best example among them.

As a well-known super sports media in North America, they have always been quite "authoritative" in the sports world.

Well, if we ignore the "harmless black spots" they like to whitewash the players under Hook.

But no matter what, ESPN's influence is unquestionable.

It is precisely because of this amazing influence that they actually did not think much of the e-sports market at the beginning.

After all, they are noble traditional sports stars and have extensive media influence in the four major leagues in North America. Why should they pay attention to a bunch of lousy gamers?

This idea continued until the major professional leagues of League of Legends grew to a size that could no longer be ignored.

Take the North American LCS as an example. The growth rate in this year is nothing short of terrifying.

Especially in summer.

The magical team Jia Shi is like a catfish that disrupts the environment. Although it has disrupted the original environment, it has also brought new vitality to the LCS, which had a slightly low overall atmosphere after the failure in MSI.

Audiences, especially those in North America, love to watch this kind of plot.

The enemy from the mysterious East landed in North America, and right from the start they started stirring up chaos and destroying the world, and no one could stop them.

After being beaten for a period of time, the local people finally came to their senses and understood some mysterious things like willing and family. They finally united in the face of a powerful enemy.

After countless sacrifices, the last man finally killed the enemy at a terrible cost.

Well, it's a standard Hollywood sci-fi movie script.

All in all, after Excellent Era's commotion, the LCS, which already had a strong momentum of development, has become even more popular.

Although in terms of market value and commercial realization, it is certainly not comparable to traditional sports leagues due to many reasons such as insufficient realization channels.

But just in terms of voice among young people, many e-sports games, with League of Legends at the forefront, have already gained a popularity that even traditional sports leagues would envy.

After all, due to the development of the times, coupled with the existence of some leaders with amazing wisdom and alliance leaders,

Even a league like LPL, which has been very successful in developing overseas markets, has seen its popularity decline year by year in recent years, especially among young people, the decline is quite obvious.

It is no wonder that ESPN wants to join in the fun as it has finally found a field that is related to competitive sports and is still on the rise in the new era and can flourish.

But the challenge facing ESPN is clear and severe: they are late to the game.

Although the ecological construction of other overseas leagues is certainly not as good as the LPL invested by Tencent, with a ready-made homework to copy, the development will not be too slow.

For example, in the media camp, whether it is the new media that has gradually become mainstream in recent years, or the mainstream media array in which ESPN itself is located, there have long been people with sharp eyes who have taken the lead.

It is undoubtedly difficult for ESPN to carve out a place for itself in this area that has been almost completely occupied.

What’s worse is that the “professionalism” that ESPN usually prides itself on doesn’t work in this new field.

In traditional sports, they are able to attract a group of well-known sports media people, former well-known athletes and coaches, etc. to provide ESPN with exclusive high-quality content.

And in the field of e-sports?

Except for the half-dead game Honor of Kings, there is no such thing as "retired celebrities" in other games.

The major clubs are competing for talents who can provide high-quality content much more than ESPN.

The era of land grabbing is over. There is no way to make money lying down.

There is a serious lack of talent in the e-sports field, and there is no way to carve out a niche for oneself through content.

then what should we do?

There are only two ways to go:

Provoking war and gossip.

As for gossip, after all, most of the e-sports players are teenagers addicted to the internet. Except for a very small number of veteran players, most of them have only been working in the e-sports industry for a short time. Even if they have fallen, they still have to go through the process.

So far, there has been no gossip in the global e-sports community that is truly important enough for a media outlet of ESPN’s size to be willing to openly share.

So, it seems that there is only one way left for ESPN to go.

Fortunately, ESPN is experienced in creating buzz through provocative remarks.

Especially when it comes to putting together a ranking list that can make the audience argue, they have a fine tradition.

Back then, they had done the magic gold operation of sending Kobe Bryant, who was in his prime, out of the top five shooting guard positions in the NBA, thus angering the 8.1 billion blacksmith.

And now, it’s just a matter of moving similar operations to the field of e-sports.

So, the LOL professional player rankings produced by ESPN, which made e-sports fans all over the world feel uneasy, was released.

A well-known traditional media with a wide reputation in the field of traditional sports. Most of the players on the list have not fought against each other much, and there is no win-lose relationship.
Without any online voting or expert interviews, they just used some information and videos they found on the Internet to hastily put together a list of players' strengths across positions and regions.
And released through its own official channels.

Just by putting these few sentences together, you can feel the full sense of abstraction.

As expected, soon after the list was released, it launched a large-scale indiscriminate attack on players and fans in all top divisions.

Take the LPL players as an example. Huang Shaotian, who just won the LPL Summer Championship and the Summer Championship FMVP, did not get the first place. It would be fine if it was Zhang Jiale who won the first place instead of Huang Shaotian. After all, he is the only world champion + FMVP so far, and his hard honors are impeccable.

The key point is that world champion Mr. Zhang Jiale ranks third on this list.

Oh, Huang Shaotian is second.

And the first place was finally given to Ye Xiu.

The reason given is also very magical:
"Although Ye Xiu from the LPL region only finished second in the spring and summer due to various reasons."

"But his outstanding individual performance and unparalleled dominance in the middle lane made us decide to rank him first on this list based on the individual strength of the players."

How should I put it? This ridiculous excuse seems only slightly better than “I should be number one on everyone’s list.”

Although Ye Xiu's performance was indeed outstanding in the mid lane, if we really talk about the expressiveness of individual performances, his teammates in the top lane are far ahead.

The feeling of life and death on the road is enough to confuse anyone.

In comparison, Ye Xiu, who is a stable C and can provide high-intensity support to his teammates, is not that amazing in terms of pure visual perception.

However, considering that Tang Rou’s ranking on this list is not low, and Ye Xiu’s own identity is rather special.

Brilliant resume, rich honors, huge traffic, strong connections...

This is simply an e-sports James——

Even though they were runners-up in spring and summer, at least they have a real dynasty in Glory.

For ESPN, which has a special liking for this type of player, it seems understandable to rank Ye Xiu first.

But if it comes to the LPL fan base, it will be a bloody storm.

Blue Rain fans were unhappy, and Happy fans were even more unhappy.

What is this, giving Ye Xiu an "Most Popular Award by the Media"?
It's enough to be a troublemaker.

Because of ESPN's huge influence, even Ye Xiu himself had to do a long-unseen live broadcast on the night this damn list was released.

The content of the live broadcast is very clear, it is about cutting.

"I'm very happy to be recognized by ESPN, but I don't think I'm qualified to take the first place until I defeat Blue Rain and Fanhua and complete my revenge in the finals..."

God knows how Ye Xiu managed to say this sentence through gritted teeth.

Similar things are also happening in other regions.

When ESPN makes the rankings, it seems like it is determined to make all the fans unhappy and make them as controversial as possible.

In the neighboring LCK, their highest ranked player is Faker, and the reason is exactly the same as Ye Xiu, that is, his individual performance is strong.

Well, I’m so strong that I’ve hit my head against the wall. How can I not be strong?

The current SKT is not the Truck One of the future and does not have such a solid fan base.

This time he was also in a panic because of the angry Xingza and Kza, and he hurriedly cut it.

It’s okay for these competition zones that are tens of thousands of kilometers away. After all, no matter how angry they are, they can’t reach ESPN headquarters.

But I don’t know if ESPN has grown too big, but it actually did the biggest thing in the LCS.

They simply formed an all-Asian class for the top 20 players from LCS.

C9's Doublelift and IMPACT, Jia Shi's Qiu Fei and Abin, wow, a total of four players made it into the top of LCS, all of them are Asian.

Now, we can see with our own eyes how furious the American rednecks will be.

This unresearched list full of stereotypes can be said to have done its best to fan the flames. While causing chaos in all major competition areas, it also brought a terrifying wave of traffic to ESPN.

Although ESPN's reputation in the field of e-sports will inevitably go in the direction of pure comedians in the future, they have succeeded in leaving a deep impression in the hearts of League of Legends fans around the world.

However, after a few days, when the initial craze of the fighting between team fans and individual fans gradually faded, the LPL fans calmed down and looked at this fun-filled list again, and suddenly they really laughed for the first time.

If you look closely at this top 20 ranking, it seems that the content is a little bit high.

ESPN readily gave eight spots to players playing in the LPL alone. Even LGM managed to get Guohao, a jungler who had previously had little international fame, into the top 20.

And if the restrictions of "LPL" are expanded a little bit, for example, as long as they are Chinese nationals, then it will immediately expand to eleven people.

In addition to the two players from Excellent Era, there is also... G2's new top laner, Bai Shu.

The World of Warcraft top laner... no, in this world he should be called the Glory top laner Wunder, his career, just like the game he loves, began to take a sharp turn for the worse this summer.

Bai Shu, an ordinary foreign student who looked unremarkable and had never been in LPL, was actually able to surpass him in performance.

It's not just about the superiority in hard power, but also the adaptation in style.

Compared to Wunder, Bai Shu is much less murderous on the offensive end and his style is not as aggressive.

But it is precisely because of this stability that he has become a rare player who can provide a backup for the team in G2, a team whose overall style is that of a reckless man.

Anyway, the other brothers are all capable enough, and a top laner like him who is steady and willing to sacrifice, yet can still serve as the core at critical moments, has become a rare commodity in LEC.

Because of this, he quickly secured his spot as G2's starting top laner and performed well as the team won the championship.

In the end, he received votes second only to mid laner CAPS, ranking second in the FMVP voting.

However, considering that his personal performance is still mainly stable and he has relatively few highlight moments, ESPN ranked him in the top 20, probably just to add fuel to the fire in LEC.

However, LPL viewers don’t care about these things. What they care about is that more than half of the players on this list are of Chinese nationality.

If this can't demonstrate the dominance of LPL, then what can?

Although such false reputation is nothing compared to real hard honors, the weather is starting to get colder anyway, so it’s never too late to have one more robe to keep warm.

As a result, ESPN's reputation in LPL has quickly recovered in the past few days from "a wild chicken that came from nowhere to stir up trouble" to "an authoritative sports media with a high reputation in North America."

It's gratifying, it's gratifying...

　I’m stuck, sorry, I’ve laid enough groundwork and it’s time to move on to the main storyline.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)