The Croatian Luka “Perkz” Perković (24) is nominally the strongest European player in League of Legends. He and his team Vitality have brought in an excellent German bot lane with Upset and Kaiser. But this summer, once again, things are going wrong: The team has lost 7 games in a row, and nothing is coming together during the 2023 summer season in the LEC.
What’s going on with Perkz?
- Perkz was the dominant force in European LoL from 2015 to 2020. He was considered an absolute “winner-type”.
- With G2, he was able to dominate the league, winning 8 championship titles, leading the team to the finals of the 2019 World Championship, and then allegedly moving to the USA for 5 million $ and even able to elevate a mediocre US team significantly.
- However, since December 2021, he has been with Team Vitality in France, wanting to start a European mega-team with substantial financial backing that could become champions. But for the last 2 years, nothing has gone as planned, nothing is coming together. For years, the team has been failing to meet its own expectations and is becoming weaker from season to season.
“Super-Team” has a strong roster – 0 success
How is the team set up this year? On paper, Team Vitality actually looks fantastic:
- They have the veteran Perkz in the mid lane
- On the top lane, they have the young South Korean Photon (21) who came from the academy of the Korean cult team T1
- In the jungle, they play with the Chinese Bo (21), someone who was considered an Asian super-talent
- The German bot lane is excellently filled with the experienced Germans Upset (ADC) and Kaiser (Support): Upset has frequently dominated the statistics as a reliably performing ADC, Kaiser has championship experience with MAD Lions.
Kaiser joined Team Vitality in December 2022, and Upset joined in March 2023 after losing his starting position at Fnatic to the Swede Rekkles.
Perkz and the 2 Germans finish last in the LEC – Season ends early
But how is it going? Despite this top lineup, things are going terribly for Team Vitality: Out of 8 games in the short regular season, the team could only win one. That was the first match. Since then, they have lost 7 games in a row.
With a record of 1-7, they are at the bottom of the LEC in summer 2023. They have long been out of the running for the championship title.
This is what the comments say: On Reddit, people don’t have anything nice to say about Team Vitality.
After a defeat (19-4) against Fnatic, the people there comment:
- “Vitality is an interesting name for a team that shows no spark of life”
- Perkz is being called “washed”, past his prime, scorned
- Team Vitality is following the example of their mascot, the bee, which is also on the verge of extinction
Perkz speaks of downward spiral and negative momentum
What does Perkz say? He is typically cynical on Twitter:
On July 2, he wrote: “We tried. A downward spiral and momentum do exist. I don’t feel comfortable with my picks and gameplay – I should be playing better.”
Then he wrote: “To be honest, it doesn’t even feel real. Writing this feels like a bad dream to me. We are really not as bad as it looks right now.”
Even the usually successful Upset writes only: “I have no words. I’m so sorry.”
Why do they seem so disappointed? For Perkz and the two Germans, the LoL season has been over since early January.
8 out of 10 teams qualified for the group stage, but Team Vitality couldn’t even achieve that. Alongside the chronically weak Astralis, the actual “super-team” was already eliminated from the competition.
The highest stakes.
Fnatic rebounds – MAD Lions disappoint in the group stage
Is there a positive surprise in summer 2023? Besides G2 Esports, Fnatic has bounced back. They had a terrible time in LoL but since Rekkles was replaced by a South Korean and also Wunder left the team, things seem to be improving.
G2 Esports, Perkz’s former team, also seems to have handled the rebuild well. Caps has now finally matured into the franchise player that Perkz used to be.
Both teams concluded the season decisively with 8-1 (G2 Esports) and 7-2 (Fnatic) and are in 1st and 2nd place respectively. Both teams have now made it through the group phase and will face off against Excel and Team Heretis in the playoffs to determine who will ultimately be the champion.
For the otherwise successful team MAD Lions, a troubling time has also begun. They finished the regular season negatively with a 4-5 record and had lost 5 games in a row.
In the group stage, they were eliminated from the championship race without a victory.
What’s behind it: It is puzzling why a team in LoL performs well or not. In South Korea, the super team T1 around Faker is currently crumbling because the star mid laner is unavailable, and without him, they apparently cannot win a single game. They actually have world-class players in the roster who should be able to manage it alone.
On paper, Team Vitality should actually dominate the league or at least contest the title with G2, but evidently, momentum and team chemistry play such a significant role that they cannot fend off a downward trend.
Fnatic, on the other hand, who have had years of turmoil, must have only had to tweak 1 or 2 screws, and then the old success was back.
It all started so promisingly for Perkz in France in 2022:
LoL: Money does get kills – The assembled super team knocks out the champion
