Sunday’s contests feature heavy hitters in Top Esports versus EDward Gaming and Damwon KIA versus Gen.G, two faltering upper tier teams face each other in Suning versus Royal, whereas a strong Bilibili looks to crush a dead last V5, and likewise with Nongshim versus Hanwha Life Esports. 

Captain
BDD ($10,500)
Plenty of strong mid laners in great match-ups on Sunday, but BDD is uniquely cheap, and has the opportunity to play against the autofilled Canyon; who appears to be a decent mid laner, but mid tier at best, whereas BDD has been dominating the league game after game. Gen.G is on top of the world right now, whereas Damwon is crumbling. Your alternative is the strong laner Cryin against Angel- a player known for his weak laning phase. I’d recommend picking up Cryin as your mid laner, and BDD as captain.
Alternatives to consider: Cryin ($11,100) 

Top Lane
Rascal ($6,200)
I’ve talked over and over again about Rascal’s ascent to #1 after an underwhelming debut. Instead of rephrasing what I’ve typed again and again, I’d like to shine a spotlight on his alternative: Rich. Rich’s opponent in Dudu or Morgan (depends how HLE feels; it’ll likely be Dudu) is a bottom tier top laner that can only look decent against players like Kingen. Rich is a strong player on a team that’s slowly realizing its potential- consider comboing him with Peanut to smash HLE’s fragile top side.
Alternatives to consider: Rich ($6,000) 

Jungle
Peanut ($7,000)
YoHan looks like a useless coinflipper in many of HLE’s matches, and while I consider Arthur to be much better, it’s not always apparent that HLE themselves acknowledge that. Peanut has been a solid jungler for a number of seasons- and was formerly the firm #1, but it hasn’t been until summer 2021 that we have been reminded how fantastic Peanut can actually be. Nongshim has climbed from the #6 spot in the league in spring, all the way to #2 just by upgrading mid laners- a role intrinsically tied with jungle. With Gori by Peanut’s side, he can really dominate the rift once again just as he did with Faker (and Kuro) once before.
Alternatives to consider: Jiejie ($6,800) 

Mid Lane
Cryin ($7,400)
Laning specialist versus a player who is memed that he can’t lane at all. RNG’s biggest differential role by role is in middle lane and support, since Zhuo hasn’t inspired anything remarkable within me either. Angel can be decent on picks that don’t need to lane like control mages, or when he’s given extreme jungle pressure, but SofM can’t be expected to permanently babysit his mid laner while Wei runs wild across the map. Scout is a solid secondary option, facing off against a Knight that appears weak, but at a $200 upgrade, I am happy sticking with Cryin.
Alternatives to consider: Scout ($7,600) 

ADC
Aiming ($8,200)
Easiest pick on the day and well worth saving your money for. Aiming is easily the best player on BLG, a mid table team with a solid top 6 bottom lane, but V5 is dead last with the weakest point on the roster- although, there’s many of them- likely being their bottom lane. If anything, 

Aiming’s team being relatively mediocre is amazing for him, since it allows him to pick up even more kills as opposed to them funneling into his teammates. Viper faces off against Jackeylove and Zhuo on Sunday, EDG handling the best bottom lane in the league should prime him to pick up massive points against the mid table TES. 

Alternatives to consider: Viper ($7,800) 

Support
Ppgod ($5,800)
Combining BLG’s strong bottom lane is a solid move, especially since Ppgod is actually pretty cheap relative to the other support options on Sunday. He’s strong in lane, and is capable when navigating the map, impacting his top side. It’s Ppgod who can bring you big points and help catch some of those “isolated” kills on top side that Aiming just can’t reach, if they happen to occur- furthermore, his close proximity to Aiming multiplies the points Aiming does collect against the worst team in the league. If nothing else, you can combine EDG’s bottom lane for a similar effect, also.
Alternatives to consider: Meiko ($6,000) 

Team
Gen.G ($4,800)
Gen.G is the best team in the LCK, and while I think the best actual team may be in the LPL, I still think that they would go toe to toe with EDG or LNG. They play a much more controlled and slow style, prioritizing fighting over objectives as opposed to reckless skirmishes, which makes me favor them in the captain spot. Alternatively, 2nd placed Nongshim against 9th placed HLE also catches my eye favorably for a secondary team choice.
Alternatives to consider: Nongshim RedForce ($5,000) 

Stacks
Aiming & Zeka
BLG’s carries are solid, while Uniboy has shown promise in the past on Taiwanese squads, since moving to the mainland, he hasn’t had the same effect. Aiming is a Korean prodigy and well worth Bilibili’s money- they’ve earned a strong ADC without having to compete with the high costs of domestic superstars. 

Cryin & Ming 

The mid-jungle of RNG exploits the largest gaps of SN- support and mid. Support in particular is a massive advantage towards controlling the map, and Ming is a great candidate for breaking Cryin out of his lane, which he should easily win versus Angel, and leveraging that advantage across the entire map. 

Rich & Peanut 

HLE’s top side is absolute garbage. Both junglers and top laners are not good at all (sorry, Arthur- I want to love you.) whereas Nongshim are a much more complete team with their cornerstone in the mid lane. HLE’s mid and bottom lane are relatively decent, but the black hole of their squad can easily be smashed by some of Nongshim’s most consistent players. 

Top Picks: Aiming, Cryin, Ming 

Each player targets a blatant weakness in the opposing squad- Cryin shows you that you can ball on a budget by confronting a player’s biggest weakness with a player’s specialty. Ming and Aiming are both ridiculously expensive, but their opponents being some of the worst players in their respective roles grants them tremendous value. 

Top Value: Rich, Peanut, BDD 

Nongshim is underrated for being #2 in a top league- Rich especially has been slept on for a long while, but he’s quietly grown into a solid top laner like Rascal. Peanut’s resurgence makes me overjoyed, especially since his time was mostly wasted on a squad like LGD. Finally, BDD is the strongest mid laner in the league, and he’s playing against a jungler playing off role- mostly playing Lulu for what was formerly the 10th placed jungler, Malrang, on Jin Air.