The reigning PKL and Global champions, OP Gaming Rangers, are the only team from the Big 4 to make a roster change after the Phase 1, as they have moved Tae “Giken” Kwang Kim from the now-defunct OPG Hunters, replacing retiring Choi “BBABBO” Seong-cheol. That should bring a bit of fresh air into OPGR roster, as they will aim to become the first team to defend the PKL championship.

Finishing 14th in the Faceit Global Summit after making through the Group Stage in the 4th place and winning the first map of the Finals surely was a bitter end of Phase 1 for Afreeca Freecs Fatal. But the good news is that they’re back to playing in a League format, in which AFF consistent play shines most, and they managed to keep their roster intact for the remainder of 2019 season. Time will show if Style’s leadership and monster duo of Shad0w and NN will be enough to regain the PKL title.

On one side, Team VSG lead by Lee “Starlord” Jong-ho seems to have every piece of the PUBG team puzzle — Starlord’s shotcalling and sniper skills are outstanding, Hulk is a monster fragger, duo of Hwan2da and Daengche are averaging over 2 kills per game and they know how to mix both aggressive and passive styles of play.

But then there’s consistency issue — one day they look like a Global Championship contender, but on the other day they’re just another team on the battlegrounds ( PKL Week 4 Saturday, Week 5 Monday and Miramar part of FGS Finals Day 1 comes to mind ). And with more and more teams getting on VSG trail, this may be the last chance for them to beat this problem before a downfall.

Right now, OGN Entus Force seems to be stuck as the gatekeepers of the proscene — they are playing too consistent and good to finish lower than 5th with their current roster, but they seem to lack the power to bring themselves through the finish line and claim the 1st place for themselves.

Because of that, Force may be heading into PKL Phase 2 with even more pressure than ever — winning the championship would be the vindication this roster needs, similar to Liquid’s win in Starseries PUBG Season 2, but if they finish close-but-not-close-enough once again, the future of this roster would start to become uncertain.

Challengers to the glory

PKL Phase 1 was a ground-breaking league for Detonator.Korea — they have rolled through the first half of the league ( 231 points after Week 3, avg 9.625 pt per game ), only to collapse in the second half and not even qualify to the FGS. Even with that, and problems of the team’s shotcaller, Kim “WICK2D” Jin-hyeong, DTN management made what looks like a right call, and decided to not change their roster heading into the Phase 2.

DTN.KR manager ( and propably everyone’s) reaction for VSG, OGN Force and DTN ending in one group

After seasons of spending money to get star players from the other teams and collapsing every single time, with 6th place in 2019 Phase 1 being their best result, OPGG have decided to pull the plug on OP Gaming Hunters. Replacing them will be newly-formed OP Gaming Ardor, a team built with the prospects and the players that haven’t found their place in the other teams. This won’t be a easy time for them, as they’ll have to quickly find their synergy and will propably sit in the lower half of the standings.

In Phase 1 Element Mystic have impressed everyone with their consistent placement finishing ( 34 out of 48 games in top 8, avg place of 6.7 was the 2nd highest in the league after OPGR ), but they have been lacking a firepower to truly contest for the FGS spot ( 3.6 kill per round, top teams didn’t went below 4.3 ). Signing “K1nch” and “Pallas” to the roster doesn’t look like a right pickups to overcome that issue at the first glance, but this is where EM can prove everyone wrong again and qualify to the upcoming Asia Classic.

Somehow and someway, ( SK Telecom ) T1 have managed to build their roster with the promising prospects, which showed a improvement in both consistency and firepower that lead them to the 8th place in what can be considered as their ‘rebuilding’ season.

The upcoming stage shouldn’t be the time to contend for the championship for the SKT Empire yet, but a ticket to the Asia Classic is definitely within a reach for them.

Weeks 3 and 4 of Phase 1 gave the fans of Lavega Esports optimism — in both weeks they were amongst the best scoring teams, continuing their improvement from their mediocre start. But the final two weeks have exposed Lavega’s weakness — they made a ton of placement finishes ( 14/16 games in top 8 ), but a lack of kills ( 2.88 kill per game ) and their struggle to get a Chicken Dinner ( single 3rd and 4th place finish as their best ) forced Lavega to settle for the 9th place.

To make things look worse, Lavega had to pay a huge price for this result — their best killer, Bang “Alphaca” Ji-min have left the team and have signed with OGN Ace. It may be up to the perfomance of team’s new member, Gu “GuSeungChan” Seung-chan, whether Lavega can at least defend their position from Phase 1.

The previous leg of PKL was up-and-down for the Citroën-sponsored Team Quadro, as they were mixing good and bad days throughout the Phase 1, tooking out their chances to repeat their Top 5 finish from 2018 Season 2 in the process. The improvement in the later part of previous phase and a decision to not change the roster however brings a lot of hope that Quadro can return to being a contender in Phase 2.

Oh wow, DPG AGON looks really good in the first two weeks of 2019 Phase 1, hell, they’re third in the standings after Week 2. They actually can do it, they can break out from the mediocrity and be a championship conten…

Source : OGN

…what about their sister team, Danawa DPG ? Yes, their roster have been rebuilded after 2018 season, but they have experienced and talented players, so this should be enough to lead DPG off the mediocrity…

OGN trashtalk segments are something that I miss in PKL

DPG teams have disappointed and spent Phase 1 in the mediocrity of the league — AGON couldn’t find their mojo after Week 2, struggling to play consistently and ending 11th at the end, while Danawa DPG felt like they were just there, racking up enough points to stay away from relegation zone, but showing up just for the few of their 48 games.

As a effort to finally break out from the mid-pack of the league, DPG decided to make a roster swap — Gak and Inonix from AGON ( now DPG EVGA ) moved to Danawa, while Juwon and SuPPak went the other way. Inonix’s a great rifler that should improve Danawa’s perfomance, but I think these changes won’t be enough to finish in the top third of PKL.

12th place in Phase 1 doesn’t properly display Team MVP’s perfomance there — team lead by their ace player, Chung “Hexa” Seong-yun, racked up a ton of good day perfomances, but a few bad days, especially in the final week ( 1 point on W6 Monday ) have kicked them out of the money positions. Between the stages MVP suffered a blow, as their second best player in Cho “Asura” Sang-won have signed a contract with Griffin, but not only the remaining players have played together for the most of the previous Phase, MVP have also decided to bring back their former team captain, Kang “Siege”Ho-jin back after a one phase hiatus. With that, MVP should be considered as a contender for a spot in the Asia Classic.

Coming to PKL Phase 1 as the only non-sponsored team, Kingsroad have caught the people’s eyes with the second-best perfomance of Week 1 ( 80 points ), but that turned out to be a fluke, as they couldn’t repeat that perfomance and slowly fell from the upper half of the standings.

Heading into the upcoming Phase, Kingsroad decided to tweak their roster, replacing Park “pbans” Jae-hyeon with a former member of Cesti Esports, Ji “Coldbuff” Ho-yeon, in order to improve their position and catch the attention of the potential sponsors.

First two weeks of the Phase 1 was a nightmare fuel for Gen.G and their fans , scoring just 60 points in two weeks, standing barely above the relegation zone. They bounced back, averaging 50 points per week, but the 14th place finish was still nowhere close to the team’s potential.

For the further improvement, Gen.G decided to pick up … Cha “Pio” Seung Hoon ???

Don’t get me wrong, this looks like a good pickup — Pio is arguably the best fragger in Korea right now- but Gen.G was already stacked with the shooters and that wasn’t considered a problem that needs to be solved. And on top of that, we’ve been in the same place last phase — Han ”Maczora” Dae-Kyu have came to Gen.G before the start of 2019 season as one of best fraggers in Korea, but he couldn’t find his place and was first benched, then he left the team after Phase 1. Can “Pio” and Gen.G not repeat the mistakes of the past, and return to being a championship contender, only time will tell.

For the Griffin Red, Phase 1 of PKL was a rebuilding time — team lead by Yoon “Merald” Hui-seong was coming off a team’s rebranding from Kongdoo Reddot ,roster changes and a weak perfomance of most of the squad. There is a hope and optimism for future coming from that time tho — Lee “Curious” Yeong-min is turning into one of the best players in Korea right now ( 1.40 K, 1.08 Knocks, 258 DMG per round ), GRF Red have shown that they can be consistent, and Cho “Asura” Sang-won will join as the replacement of underperfoming Yoon “Breakneck” Da-hyeon. With all of that, Griffin Red can once again be a contender for the top ranks of PKL.

It feels like forever since OGN Entus Ace was considered as a good team…

Source : OGN Entus

Due to wrong decisions and bad luck, the current state of OGN Ace is worrying — Seong Jang “SeongJang” Hwan was moved to OGN Force before PKL 2018 Season 2, weakening team’s firepower, former shotcaller in Lee “Temeria” Gil-do decided to run away from the team after 2018 PKL S2, team’s main firepower in Park “Joy” Hye Min hit a slump in PKL Phase 1 and most of the transfers Ace did since the end of PKL 2018 Season 1 didn’t improve the situation.

With that and 17th place finish in Phase 1, OGN decided to make yet another roster shuffle, picking up “Raeng” and “Alphaca”, while keeping Mickey, Joy and the one player OGN could always count on since the forming of Ace — Lee “CRISTIS” Joon-su. Even with that, OGN Ace have no room for mistakes anymore — another collapse can send this team to the dreaded Contenders.

Well, congratulations Team Square, you guys have defended your place in PKL. After a disastrous 12-point Week 1, you have managed to improve, find a consistent form and avoided a relegation. The future looks bright for them, as even with Byun “Sparr0vv” Jung Hwan singing with Afreeca Ares Square should be a mid-tier team in Phase 2…

…What do you mean they kicked their ENTIRE ROSTER ???

Possibly the biggest WTF roster change to date in KR PUBG ( source: OGN )

In the place of them, Team Square have built a entirely new roster, featuring ( edit : not a former EM player in ) NEWCODE and a ex-member of Contenders team Warriors in Hanya. The remaining of the roster is a mystery box though, as for them this will be their first time playing on a proscene ( at least to my knowledge ). Because of that, anything other than relegation should be considered as a success for the boys in pink.

I’m not joking about those pink shirts ( Source : Team Square )

Things haven’t clicked for APK Prince’s newly-built roster in Phase 1 — guys coming from ROX in “KIMGONI” and “LeClo” slumped hard, team had a couple of good games ( including a 22-kill round ) but for the most of the phase they have been struggling, and they barely defended their PKL spot. In difference to the teams around them, APK decided to not change their roster, which can bring concerns when having their previous perfomance in mind, but if APK manage to work through their struggles and improve as a team, they should end up as more than a team in the bottom-third of PKL standings.

Collapse may have not be enough of a word to summarise Afreeca Freecs Ares perfomance in Phase 1 — sure, they have scored more than 50 points in Weeks 2 and 5, but all those results did was to save Ares from a relegation to the PKC. To make things look worse, their best player in Hwang ‘GukHyun’ Seung-hyeon decided to retire and become a full-time streamer, making space for Byeon “Sparr0vv” Jung-hwan. If there is a positive, “R0wha”, “Bong” and “Meerkat” all were in a slump during previous stage, and if they managed to get over it, Ares can contend for a spot in the middle of the pack.

The Inbounding Contenders

Rounding-up the team list for PKL Phase 2, we have four teams that have qualified through the Phase 1 of PUBG Korea Contenders. First off, we have Media Bridge, that due to missing out their place for PKL Phase 1 had to go through the PKC in order to return back to the top division. And not only they did make it, they did it by stomping all over the PKC.

( Source : PUBG Esports Korea and OGN )

Now as they’re back in the PKL, Media Bridge’s roster, with their core players playing in the Korea League before teaming up for 2019, want to prove themselves worthy of being amongst Korea’s top teams.

Known in PKC as KST, Griffin Black is a team of up-and-coming amateurs, backed up by “RAGE” ( that played in the OGN PSS Beta in team KakaoTV ) and “OhJungJe” ( ex-MVP, Actoz Red, 247 and GRF White, joined the team between phases ), that with a desire to show a great perfomance and a mix of both aggressive and strategical play managed to make it to the PKL. Now, as they’re entering the big league, they have one more desire — upset the big dogs and make themselves a place in the PKL.

E-STATS Esports ( previously eT ) and World Class share a lot of similarities between each other — two amateur teams that battled through the PKC to get a spot in PKL, and are filled with players that will debut in the Korea’s top division ( with exception of that being “Slaco”, who played in Kongdoo teams in late 2018 ). PKL isn’t gonna be easy for these teams, but both eT and World Class have a dream to get big in the proscene, and they won’t back down for the upcoming challenge.

The 2019 Hot6 PKL Phase 2 will start on Monday May 20th, 7pm KST / noon CEST / 3am PDT — tune in to the official streams on AfreecaTV and Twitch or to the English Rebroadcast ( Details TBA ). You can also support the PKL by either visiting the games live in Seoul ( tickets here ) or by buying the league-themed jacket skin in the PUBG in-game store.