Pick 'Em is one of my favourite things about the Counter-Strike Majors, but this time around things might have gone horribly wrong.
As I sit down to write this column, the swiss portion of The PGL Major is approximately half way to being finished. My Pick ‘Em, on the other hand, is almost entirely finished. Kaput. How did it go so badly wrong?
I don’t meant to brag, but at the last two majors I got a silver trophy for my Pick ‘Ems, and only narrowly missed out on gold at the last one. This time, I’ll be lucky to get bronze. So how did it go so poorly? What mistakes did I make? Is there anything we can learn, going forward?
The most glaring error I made was picking Faze for my 3-0 spot. Sure, they’ve had their troubles lately, I thought, but they are still a world class team. They will get it together in time for the major, right? Apparently not. There is no nice way to say this: Faze looked terrible in Krakow and fully deserved an early exit. The players said as much on Twitter, so it is at least clear that they know the extent of their shortcomings.
What can we learn from this? Recent form is a better indicator of a team’s current ability than historical form. Yes, Faze finished third at ESL One Cologne - certainly a decent position, considering the quality of opposition - but they were far from convincing. Losing 16-4 on the first map of the semi-final was pretty damning, but at the time we put it down to SK playing phenomenally well. SK have continued in that same rich vein of form but Faze looked out of ideas in Krakow. Strategically they looked spent and neither Rain nor Niko were capable of dragging the team out of its rut. Performances like this often lead to slumps and Faze will need to be careful they do not let that happen.
Speaking of slumps, I had Virtus Pro in my 0-3 spot. This one, I think, is a far more reasonable mistake to make. VP were runners-up at the previous major but that was six months ago. Since then, they have plummeted down the HLTV rankings from second all the way to 15th and got relegated from ESL Pro League again en route. They were tied with Tyloo for last place at ESL One Cologne and apart from success at a minor Eastern European tournament last month, they had looked dire for several months.
Appropriately enough, though, as the opposite of my 3-0 mistake, the lesson from my 0-3 mistake is that class is permanent. Recent form is important, sure, but a truly great team will always recover, eventually. Virtus Pro is a truly great team. They have been through slumps before and emerged from them as championship winners. The past six months have not been kind to Polish fans but is it such a huge surprise that they come out of their slump in time for a tournament on home soil? Granted, there are still games to play before they make it to the next stage, but it almost seems written in the stars that VP will do well at this event.
As for my other seven advancing teams, well they are still up in the air. I did pick Flipside and Mousesports, both of which are on the brink of elimination, but three of my picks are currently 1-1 and SK is 2-0. It’s too early in the tournament to really say we’ve learned a lot from these teams, though SK did seem like a pretty safe bet and continue to do so. Gambit also being 2-0 feels pretty good. It seemed like a bit of a risky pick when I locked them in, but they always seem to perform on LAN. A 16-6 win over G2 was a nice reward for my faith in them and hopefully they can bring me some sweet, sweet Pick ‘Em Points.
Beyond Gambit, my other picks could still go either way. I’ve written a lot lately about how Counter-Strike is very unpredictable and how great that is for fans. I stand by that, but when it comes to Pick ‘Em, lack of predictability makes life much more challenging. If things go poorly today I could end up without even getting bronze trophy this time around, but a lucky headshot here or there could sneak me up to another silver. Only time will tell.
