‘Chiu on This’ is a short and regular opinion blast

Today, Cloud9 officially announced that Golden will join the roster as a full time in-game leader. From the perspective of Cloud9, I think this was the best possible solution for them.

Consider the landscape of potential in-game leaders. All of the best ones won’t leave their orgs (FalleN, gla1ve, karrigan, MSL, etc.). The better NA ones all have reasons as to why they won’t work (Daps is on a better team, seangares is out of the game, and they already tried and failed with FNS). In terms of opportunity and what they need, Golden is a good fit.

So what are his strengths and weaknesses? I’d say his leadership relies on heavy defaults where he wants individual players to be as active as possible by either getting information or getting kills. Then he’ll make a read off of that and hit a site. That is his strength and it gave structure to a Fnatic that sorely needed it at the time.

Now we come to the weakness. That style needs stronger individual players, especially as Golden is on the lower end of fragging in-game leaders relative to the rest of the scene. This is where Cloud9 suffers currently as their core includes: Skadoodle, Autimatic, and RUSH. In all likelihood Skadoodle cannot be resurrected so even when Golden puts him in more aggressive positions to make a pick, there is no guarantee he can do that consistently at the top level (arguably the odds favor him not doing it consistently at a top level). Autimatic is solid, but he has always been at his best with an aggressive entry/spacemaker like Stewie2k and no one really fits that bill. RUSH is a soldier, but doesn’t have the mentality of being a star player.

I think this Cloud9 are one to two star players from becoming a strong team again, so I think Cloud9 fans will have to wait till after the Major to see what happens next as that is the most likely time when players will look for new teams.

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