Thorin’s threads: 5 story-lines for the LCS NA playoff finals day

As exciting as playoff games and tournaments are on their own, I always find the context surrounding matches to be a key factor in enhancing the experience of watching the matches unfold. Knowing the historical component of the impact, a win or loss can have on a player's or team's career heightens the excitement. Seeing how individual performances can shape the way we think of players, make the big pressure moment they rise to or fall from only more intense. Thorin's threads picks out key story-lines to follow, with their historical and cultural context explained.

Here are five story-line threads for the LCS North American finals day, featuring TSM vs. C9 and CLG vs. Crs.

The two previous split champions battle for the third split title - Who is the best team in North America?

This is the series most people have been waiting to see all season long, their regular season games were always exciting affairs that seemed impossible to accurately predict. What's better, is that this will be a full Bo5, not some Bo3 tease that leaves you wanting more and wondering what could have been. The team that win three out of a potential five games here is very likely the best team in North America, or at least better than the other in their individual match-up.

TSM, minus Bjergsen, were the champions of LCS Spring 2013 and C9 took down the LCS Summer split title. That the latter victory came over TSM in a final, and in convincing 3:0 fashion, makes this match-up even more delicious. Someone will leave finals day as the first ever two-time LCS split champion for the NA region, but which team will it be?

Brains vs. brawn

What I love about the TSM vs. C9 match-up is that it's the classic match-up of differing styles. To use a fighting analogy, this is the heavy-hitting knockout power brawler against the technical boxer who wins by out-thinking his opponent and out-pointing him. Neither is necessarily better or more effective as a style, it's more about what fits the personnel each team brings to the game. What makes a match-up like this fun is that each team brings in their own unique strengths and each knows the others, so it's not just a matter of emphasising one's own strengths, but also looking to neutralise or not play into the opponent's.

TSM are the skill-based powerhouse, coming in boasting top two NA region players at every single position, minus jungler. This is a team that can theoretically win any and every lane, sometimes at the same time, as well as team-fight well. Just as the strength of that roster approach is an overwhelming power that can force its way back into games in which they are behind and roll over teams in games they are ahead, the weakness is that those kinds of teams can often improve their teamplay but it's more difficult to be very tactically sound. The reason for that is well highlighted in the C9 line-up, a team which is tactically-orientated often needs to have less stars, as the correct tactical decision can require sacrificing one's own advantages or success. Who better to do that than players who weren't stars, by and large, anyway?

In this match-up we get to see if the best players in NA really are good enough to overpower the best strategic unit in NA.

Dyrus vs. Balls - Battle of the best Top laners in NA

Probably the most underrated individual rivalry in NA, this really is the closest positional rivalry in the region, barring Doublelift vs. WildTurtle. Dyrus has always been the steady rock for TSM, at least in domestic competitions, and it takes a special Top laner to get the better of him 1v1, or even 2v1 sometimes. The problem for Dyrus has always been that the flashier players, winning their lane and dominating the numbers, have always been the fan favourites. Balls stands out as the true second carry on C9, after Meteos' monster jungle prescence, so it's easy to see how he's risen to the top of many people's personal rankings.

In this match-up we get to see how the two do going head-to-head and just at the right time, as the meta has exited the tank only Top era. Dyrus has the experience and understanding of how to win all the match-ups, while Balls brings a bold confidence and a scary Jungler. Who wins over a potential five games?

CLG look to solidify their position

CLG pulled the classic "win one game to give the fans false hope" in yesterday's semi-final, even looking close to getting a grip on the second game, only to lose out in two straight and see TSM head to the final. All the promise the split had seemed to suggest suddenly evaporated and it was another split without a top two finish for the black and white faithful. Now CLG must take care of business and dispatch Curse, an opponent they should be more than capable of handling, to at least secure the third place finish. A loss here, finishing fourth, would really unravel a lot of the good feelings surrounding this split, suggesting CLG are further from being a legit international level team than they had appeared.

Curse to finish fourth again?

The joke about Curse line-ups always finishing fourth is pretty apt, in the LCS Spring 2013 split they finished there in the playoffs, then they finished there in the regular portion of the LCS Summer split. Now they are two game losses from another fourth finish, but this one has a different feel to it. In the first split they were leading the league for so long, expected to at least reach the final and contend for the title. Next time around, they had the might of EU Support Edward but failed to even reach the semi-final. This time around, they've done well to reach the semi-finals, now they have a real chance to impress if they can secure that third place finish.

Photo credit: Riot Games