The second Season of joinDOTA MLG Pro League is held at X-Games in Austin, Texas and it features a modified format from the previous edition to now include a double elimination group stage where the top two teams from each group advance while the playoffs will be played in a single elimination BO3 format. Another novelty element of the tournament is that apart from their check money, the top three teams will receive a medal, just like any other athlete of a “real“ sports. Speaking of checks, the starting prize pool has been increased considerably by the community, with $165,000 being the amount up for grabs now.
The Competitors
Evil Geniuses is one of the main favorites for this tournament not only because they are playing on home soil but they are the champions of the biggest LAN event after The International, Dota 2 Asia Championships and they are the American power house at this moment. The addition of SumaiL who almost immediately became their new star, combined with the new support Aui_2000 and the return of “The Old Man” Clinton ‘Fear’ Loomis transformed EG into a much more cohesive group and the synergy translated soon into results that put the American team in a favorite spot on all the tournaments they’ve attended this year.
Even so, the CIS DotA has always been one of the hardest to face given its aggressive style and unpredictable moves and Empire proved it in the previous season of jD-MLG League by taking home the trophy. This time they will not be at X-Games Arena to defend their title but Virtus Pro are an equally hard team to defeat. Despite the fact that they didn’t attend any LAN recently, their performance in online tournaments was top notch so this event is the opportunity to prove their skill in front of a live audience, with only two months before the biggest live event of the year.
However, for this tournament they have to face teams that are just as keen to prove their worth, Fnatic being one of them. After a long disappearance from the scene they are back with a new squad which happens to be the first ranked in South East Asia, Team Malaysia. All eyes will be on Mushi and his team as they have the mission to make the Fnatic comeback spectacular by winning their first LAN.
The stakes are even higher than winning a tournament for the Swedes as both of the representative teams, Alliance and Ninja in Pyjamas failed to qualify for The International 5 and placing as high as possible in this tournament could represent a first-aid kit for their recovery. The same story goes for Mousesports who were the top favorites in the US TI5 qualifiers and not only that they failed to get a spot for Seattle but now they have an incomplete roster and will be playing with Tyler 'TC' Cook as a short term replacement due to qojqva’s recent retirement.
Another interesting team to watch is Champions of Summer's Rift, the winners of the US open qualifiers for this year’s TI who recently had a roster change with the former Alliance mid lane player Niclas ‘Niqua’ Westergård and Mark ‘Tralf’ Seidl joining their ranks.
London Conspiracy, who replaced Vega Squadron for this event, attended their first big LAN event in April this year at DreamHack Bucharest and they impressed the audience in every game played versus much more experienced teams. In the recent European TI5 qualifiers they were the only team to beat Na’Vi, creating the biggest surprise of the group stage and they might as well do it again in Austin.
All the matches will be covered by the joinDOTA team on MLG.tv
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