League of Legends: Season 3 World Championships

All this week there's a massive League of Legends tournament taking place in California. Or at least the first part of a massive tournament is this week. The whole thing is being spread across 3 weeks. There are 14 teams in the tournament with the top team from every region except Europe getting a bye through this week's games. (Europe lost the all star game so they didn't get a bye. I like how the all star game can have actual consequences!) The remaining 10 teams are broken into two pods of 5 teams and playing a double round robin event all this week with the top 2 from each pod advancing.

The games are being casted live on all the major streaming outlets and links can be found at the main LoL esports site. They're also being pretty diligent about breaking up earlier broadcasts into proper chunks which lets people who may be asleep late at night a chance to watch the games without having to futz too much with finding the right time on a YouTube video. I was a little annoyed at how lax they got in doing this during the regular season so I stopped watching for the most part, but they seem to care more about the final event.

Spectator sports are always more fun when you're cheering for somebody, and I for one am rooting for Gambit Gaming. They used to be known as Moscow Five in previous seasons when I really started watching streams and I liked their style then. It also helps that they're Russian and I've always had a thing for rooting for Russia in sports. I think it's my contrarian nature. I distinctly recall watching some major hockey tournament when I was a kid ('87 Canada Cup probably) and cheering against Gretzky and for the USSR. Anyway, the name also reminded me of the Russian Five line the Red Wings had back in the mid 90s. The mid laner for GG even looks a little like Pavel Datsyuk!

Anyway, I know some people like to watch high level games and they might not be away that the season final event is on right now. I wouldn't have known if Lino hadn't messaged me about them! So, go watch some games!