The legacy that is Team SoloMid

Origins of TSM

Team SoloMid, most commonly known as TSM, is one of the oldest League of Legends teams ever created. The organisation was founded by Reginald who also played as the team’s mid-laner for over two years.
Before Team SoloMid’s founding in the professional League of Legends scene, Reginald along with his brother created a website, SoloMid.net. Using the website’s following, along with their strong performance in the NA LCS, it propelled TSM to the front running NA team.

TSM roster 2018

Top – Hauntzer

Hauntzer has been signed as TSM’s starting top laner since 2015, standing as one of the best not only in NA, but the world. The team is notorious for quickly switching players out if they underperform, Hauntzer’s ability through simply staying with TSM for over 2 years is an achievement in itself.

Jungle – MikeYeung

He’s one of TSM’s new pickups this year having replaced Svenskeren who moved to Cloud 9. MikeYeung is known for his extremely aggressive playstyle and carry potential, a definite change for TSM who usually relies on late game scaling for Bjergsen to carry them to victory.
The jungle had previously played for lesser known teams in the NA CS before breaking out in the NA LCS through Phoenix 1. However, his time on P1 was short lived before being poached by TSM. It is unknown if MikeYeung will continue his signature aggressive playstyle, however, it is certain the team needs a change for them to perform in the international stage.

Mid – Bjergsen

Bjergsen is undoubtedly Team SoloMid’s star as the current rosters’ longest serving player. Bjerg was picked up by TSM at the end of 2013 when he was just 17! He is often called the ‘Faker’ of the west, having stood as NA’s top mid-laner his whole time in the region. As mentioned earlier, Bjergsen is able to carry games given he doesn’t get heavily camped or focused throughout the game. Because of this, the remaining TSM members tend to play much more conservative in an effort to support Bjergsen.

ADC – Zven

Zven had earlier failed to find success in his earlier years, however, it all changed when he joined Origen with Mithy. The bot-lane duo completely dominated the EU LCS in 2016 and were considered the best bot-laners in the west. The pair then left Origen together in May 2016 to join G2 Esports, while they did fall short in the regular season, the managed to outperform the rest in playoffs, later going on to take EU’s top seed in the 2017 LoL World Championship.

Support – Mithy

Having started his competitive career with Giants Gaming in mid 2012, Mithy is regarded as one of the League’s veteran players. Mithy has always been a top tier support player, first starting off in the EU CS and finishing 2013 and 2014 with a collection of wins. However, Mithy truly shined when he signed with Origen and managed to reach the 2015 LoL World Championship, where the team finished in the semi-finals. Since then he joined G2 Esports where they remain EU’s top team in both the 2016 and 2017 season.

TSM worlds

While TSM are the only team to have ever made it to every single League of Legends World Championship, they have constantly fell short in the international stage.
This is widely seen as TSM’s only downfall, while they manage to consistently top other North American teams, they crumble against foreign pressure. This pattern has been seen year after year, where TSM take the Spring / Summer playoffs, but still manage to place lower than other NA teams in worlds.
Reginald has long expressed his wish and team’s vision statement to win a World Championship, a goal that is constantly straying further away. In the earlier years, TSM was seen as North America’s only hope to place fairly well in Worlds, but now, but those hopes seem to have been shattered for many.

Team SoloMid reddit

The TSM Reddit as expected, is a subreddit filled with memes and discussion around TSM. However, it is not always positive, with TSM ‘fans’ burdening the players with astronomical amounts of pressure when they misstep.
This was revealed in an interview with former TSM jungler Santorin who explained the team’s strong following certainly swayed his mental state when attacked through the online comments, specifically the ‘ward’ meme surrounding him.

Branching out

While TSM started out, and is most well known in the League of Legends scene, Reginald steered SoloMid to expand into other games as well. Currently, TSM, like a bunch of other larger organisations have their hands in the PUBG, Hearthstone and most recently, the Fortnite scene.

TSM CS:GO

Team SoloMid attempted to enter the CS:GO scene for a short period of time, however, the team pulled out due to their scandal with sgares. This caused a breakdown in relationship between the organisation and the team roster, its effect also negatively impacting TSM’s reputation within CS:GO as a whole. While the org had a fairly good run in CS:GO, the scandal proved too much, forcing them to cease operation.

TSM PUBG

The organisation picked up a fairly decent PUBG line-up in mid 2017. As the game was growing, it was no surprise TSM decided to jump in and invest right away.
The squad currently comprising of ‘SmaK’, ‘Viss’, ‘Break’ and ‘aimpR’.
While their tournament performance hasn’t been great, SoloMid continues to invest in these players.
However, it is unlikely the organisation wishes to expend its current presence in PUBG, since the competitive scene is slightly stale.

How will TSM do in 2018 – LoL?

Their line-up doesn’t seem too bad, having kept Hauntzer and Bjergsen from their original 2017 line-up.
However, by taking a risk to change their starting jungler, support and adc, their communication is certainly lacking, as seen by their performance in week 1 of the NA LCS.
That said, MikeYeung in an interview stated the organisation and coaching staff foresaw a slow start, but reiterated they would improve.
While their roster isn’t too bad, their ‘upgrades’ haven’t shown to be very impactful. TSM will likely continue to flop in the spring split but continue to improve, making the summer playoffs and hopefully entering worlds once again.

Photo Credits: Riot Games | LoL Esports