VCT São Paulo 2023: Lock In Pick ‘Em Predictions

Lock In Pick ‘Em Predictions: VCT São Paulo 2023

The first event of the franchise era will take place in São Paulo, Brazil. It will feature the 30 franchised teams and two Chinese teams. The format of the tournament is simple; best of 3 single elimination bracket until the semi finals.

Then the semi finals and finals will both be best of 5 matches and will remain single elimination.

The tournament is essentially a March Madness style bracket which will definitely bring on some potential favorites losing early and being done for the rest of the tournament.

There are two sides of the bracket, the Alpha side and Omega side. We’re making picks and breaking down each match from the first round all the way to the finals.

Round 1

ALPHA

Matchup: KOI vs. NRG Esports

• The Pick: NRG Esports

The old Optic team NRG is built around is notorious for losing matches early in tournaments which makes a single elimination bracket against teams with little to no film makes this scary.

KOI has a fantastic group of players, but the pick is for NRG as KOI was very recently put together and Trexx and Koldamenta are the only two who have experience playing with one another. Meanwhile the IGL difference of FNS vs. Koldamenta moves this nearly 50/50 matchup to NRG.

Matchup: DetonatioN FocusMe vs. Giants Gaming

• The Pick: Giants Gaming

Giants is composed of many unsung heroes from various EMEA rosters headlined by Nukkye. With Rhyme relieving Nukkye of being IGL, there is a good chance he returns to his previous form of being a top player in the region.

Meanwhile, Detonation’s roster built around Suggest is new and composed of players with no big game experience aside from xnfri from his time on Northeption.

Matchup: Gen. G vs. LOUD

• The Pick: LOUD

Gen. G has put together a solid group of players, most notable of which is Meteor from Northeption. It is just too hard to pick against LOUD who still has their IGL in Saadhak as well as Aspas and Less who are each arguably top 3 in their respective roles of duelist and sentinel. That alone should bring LOUD past a solid group that can make a splash in the Pacific league.

Matchup: FunPlus Phoenix vs. Karmine Corp

• The Pick: Karmine Corp

There are a lot of unknowns here; FPX is part of a new Chinese scene which exists in its own bubble and Karmine Corp has 3 lesser known players paired along 2 veterans.

Despite FPX getting through EDG as the top team in China, I have Karmine Corp here due to the one known factor which are the Benrlitom brothers ScreaM and Nivera who should be able to carry this game. This game will be ugly, but it’ll be hard for FPX to get through the top tier skill of ScreaM and Nivera.

Matchup: BBL Esports vs. DRX

• The Pick: DRX

It’s too hard to bet against DRX who was consistently a top 6 team globally, made some adjustments that boosted them to top 3 in Champions 2022, and made minimal roster changes which allows the team to play without needing to build any new chemistry.

BBL has made minimal roster moves as well, but DRX has accomplished so much more than BBL with roughly the same rosters over the past year, picking DRX is a no brainer here.

Matchup: Cloud9 vs. Paper Rex

• The Pick: Paper Rex

This was arguably the hardest pick to make of the first round. On paper Cloud9 appears to have a slightly better roster than Paper Rex, but C9 did not look convincing at Red Bull Home Ground.

Meanwhile, Paper Rex fell off at the end of last year, so both teams are looking to improve their form since they were last seen on a major stage (aside from Paper Rex playing Reyna+Yoru in a showmatch).

The pick is for Paper Rex due to the limited footage on them in a new meta which will allow them to utilize some outlandish Paper Rex-esque strats that will only be useful in one series and can catch C9 off guard. Nonetheless this matchup has some superstars in it and will be a great watch.

Matchup: Team Heretics vs. Evil Geniuses

• The Pick: Evil Geniuses

Because EG has more players! But seriously… Early in Stage 2 Challengers EG sat on top of their group after a win against Optic. They tragically fell off the planet shortly after… But what this tells me is that the coaching staff does a good job of preparing for strategies early on and once they are done routinely other teams begin to pick up on it and play around it.

This works out perfectly for a single elimination tournament in which there are no vods on EG since the additions of Ethan and BcJ who will be upgrades to their roster.

As for Heretics they looked rather uninspiring in the Red Bull Home Ground event and Boo seemed like the lone bright spot on that team that was only able to beat Futbolist at the event.

Matchup: MIBR vs. Talon Esports

• The Pick: MIBR

Most likely playing without Patiphan, MIBR will have an advantage. They were able to get solid player additions from various Brazilian teams, most notably Heat, who was at his peak when Jett was.

Arguably an even better pickup was the acquisition of bzkA, former coach of LOUD that will most likely be a big part of any improvement MIBR sees.

OMEGA

Matchup: Team Liquid vs. Team Secret

• The Pick: Team Liquid

Despite a lackluster showing at the Red Bull Home Ground event (which can be justified by missing 40% of their starting roster), Team Liquid is the favorite here due to the higher player quality.

The role overlap between Sayf and Jamppi will be an interesting factor of Liquid’s success in more difficult matches moving forward. But in this matchup, between having inferior firepower and losing their primary Killjoy player in Dispenser, Team Secret will have a tough hill to climb to beat Liquid.

Matchup: NAVI vs KRÜ

• The Pick: NAVI

Formerly as FPX, NAVI was a top team of 2022. They made one player change from Ardiis to cNed. In a Chamber meta that is a downgrade, but with the Chamber nerf and Jett being a top agent once again,

cNed has a good chance of getting back as a top player. Meanwhile KRÜ were able to secure a great controller player in Melser, but they lost their best player in Keznit. It’ll be a tall task for KRÜ to overcome this high end NAVI team.

Matchup: ZETA DIVISION vs. Leviatán

• The Pick: Leviatán

Melser was a big loss for Leviatán as they may have issues in filling his shoes at controller. Mazino from KRÜ has taken over this role and his transition to controller has a good chance of impacting their run.

Keznit was a massive pick up also from KRÜ for this team, especially as Chamber is out of the meta, Keznit and Tacolilla will most likely be swapping on a per map basis due to their capabilities of playing different agents. ZETA made no moves in the offseason which will be a good thing for the most part, but ZETA really stagnated after their Reykjavik run early in 2022.

Matchup: Team Vitality vs Global Esports

• The Pick: Team Vitality

With experienced IGLing from Bonecold and a solid cast of players headlined by Twisten who is poised for a breakout year, Vitality is the stronger roster from top down.

Aside from Ayrin, Global Esports has a very inexperienced roster on the international level and will need more time to grow.

Matchup: FUT Esports vs. Rex Regum Qeon

• The Pick: FUT Esports

There is a good chance these are two of the weakest teams in the tournament, so that makes the pick tough. Based on FUT playing in events that had higher level teams, giving them some better experience I slightly lean towards them in this pick.

Matchup: 100 Thieves vs. EDward Gaming

• The Pick: 100 Thieves

100T really impressed at Red Bull Home Ground. Bang is in a great position to be a top controller player in the world, and the addition of Cryo made this team all the stronger.

The Red Bull event was played with Chamber being busted, so it’ll be interesting to see how they approach non-Jett maps.

On the other hand EDG has lost some of their talent and will most likely be negatively impacted by the meta shift away from Chamber as their best player, ZmjjKK was essentially a Chamber one trick. He will most likely be switching to primary duelist based on their offseason events.

Matchup: Sentinels vs. FNATIC

• The Pick: FNATIC

Sentinels have a stacked roster and will evolve to a top team in the league as their team chemistry builds as well as their comms with pANcada who is a top controller player, but speaks primarily Portuguese.

Due to limited practice time for Sentinels I lean towards FNATIC as their roster is just as stacked if not more, and they have a solid core of 3 who have played together for some time with two players who slot into the final 2 roles perfectly in Leo and Chronicle.

Aside from the IGLs, the other 8 players in this match are all arguably in the top 25 players in the world, this will be a good watch.

Matchup: T1 vs. FURIA

• The Pick: FURIA

Between home field advantage and T1 looking very unconvincing at the Ludwig x Tarik Invitational, the pick goes to FURIA. Headlined by Quick and mwzera,

FURIA has some good rifles who can carry them against a struggling T1 team. T1 looks good on paper, but seems a bit off in terms of roles and fitting in recent OVerwatch convert, Carpe into the roster and a new game.

Round 2

ALPHA

Matchup: NRG Esports vs. Giants Gaming

• The Pick: NRG Esports

Another close call for NRG here as Giants have a good looking roster. NRG has good experience and a core with good chemistry while Giants is still rather new on a whole.

The other factor is that Optic was great at creating counter strats against teams with vods to review, and even just a single BO3 will help NRG prepare for this game.

Matchup: LOUD vs. Karmine Corp

• The Pick: LOUD

The fragging of ScreaM and Nivera won’t be able to put up with the likes of LOUD, headed by Aspas who has a legitimate chance of being the MVP of the tournament.

Between LOUD being a big step up from Karmin Corp’s first round opponent and LOUD having home field advantage, LOUD is a pretty easy pick here.

Matchup: DRX vs. Paper Rex

• The Pick: Paper Rex

The winner of C9 and Paper Rex having to play DRX in the second round is just brutal in terms of bracket RNG. Think this game comes down to how Foxy9 performs, who is the new pickup of DRX who will most likely be playing Jett and will need to keep up with the pace of f0rsakeN and Jinggg.

But ultimately the pick is for Paper Rex due to them having enough time with their same roster to prepare enough crazy strats that their opponents won’t be able to prepare for in their first two series.

Matchup: Evil Geniuses vs. MIBR

• The Pick: Evil Geniuses

With roster upgrades in Ethan and BcJ, the latter of whom has tons of international experience, EG should be able to take this game with a more experienced and superior roster despite playing a Brazilian team in Brazil.

OMEGA

Matchup: Team Liquid vs. NAVI

• The Pick: NAVI

This will be a fantastic match. I lean NAVI here due to only having to integrate a Jett player into their system in a Jett meta, and the roles of Sayf and Jampii potentially having some weird overlap. This meta is made for NAVI with Jett being prominent for cNed and Suygetsu being able to shine on his best agents of Viper, Cypher, and Killjoy.

Matchup: Leviatán vs. Team Vitality

• The Pick: Leviatán

I really like both these teams heading into the year. Think this ultimately comes down to LAN experience and having a great coach in Onur. The flexibility and ability to frag out while playing on any agent and IGLing, i think kiNgg will be the highlight in this series of two closely matched teams.

Matchup: FUT Esports vs. 100 Thieves

• The Pick: 100 Thieves

Easy pick here. 100T gets a layup in the second round. Top down the 100 Thieves roster is better than FUT. Should be a quick 2-0 here.

Matchup: FNATIC vs. FURIA

• The Pick: FNATIC

Think this will be closer than most foresee. FURIA almost beat FNATIC at the end of last year in Champions. But with two massive pickups in Leo and Chronicle, FNATIC is just too strong of a team to lose to a squad that’ll most likely be in the middle of the pack of the franchised teams.

Round 3

ALPHA

Matchup: NRG Esports vs. LOUD

• The Pick: LOUD

Optic core versus LOUD, no surprise if this game ends up happening due to their history playing one another. I view these teams as roughly even, but have LOUD coming on top because of the influence of the crowd. It’ll be interesting to see how LOUD’s new players cauanzin and tuyz play here against a high end team.

Matchup: Paper Rex vs. Evil Geniuses

• The Pick: Paper Rex

If Paper Rex makes it this far, it’s weird to think this will most likely be their easiest game. In this matchup I just see Paper Rex as the better team. Chamber being out of the meta will really open Paper Rex to push the pace, and allows d4v41 to have a more uniform role on the team where he doesn’t have to jump between Chamber and other agents as a support player.

OMEGA

Matchup: NAVI vs. Leviatán

• The Pick: NAVI

I think Leviatán is more than capable of beating NAVI. But as mentioned before, the meta is great for NAVI. Meanwhile Leviatán’s main win condition here would be having a hot series from a player in a fragging role, but they might get hurt here because if one of their two great duelist players in Keznit and Tacolilla is having a hot streak, the other will need to keep the pace up when they get subbed in which will be difficult.

Matchup: 100 Thieves vs. FNATIC

• The Pick: FNATIC

Arguably is the match of the tournament if we get to see this. Think these are the 2 best teams at this point of the season. For 100 Thieves to win here they’ll need Derrek to replicate his LCQ play and/or Bang replicate his Red Bull Home Ground performance.

I give this to FNATIC by a smidge because I think they have the best roster top down of any team, and I see the capability of Derke being able to play Raze and Jett at an elite level will give them an advantage in the game or map pool where 100 Thieves might be a tad limited with Cryo having only played Jett and Chamber in the last year and a half.

Semi-Finals

ALPHA

Matchup: LOUD vs. Paper Rex

• The Pick: Paper Rex

In what would be the most ridiculous run imaginable, I have Paper Rex getting to the finals.

Think the main difference makers here are the continuity of the Paper Rex roster, having a week before this match for PRX to prepare some new set plays, and LOUD having two new and unproven players in cauanzin and tuyz the latter of whom will most likely have to make a major role change due to him only playing Raze and Jett in the past which Aspas will definitely be playing.

OMEGA

Matchup: NAVI vs. FNATIC

• The Pick: FNATIC

Great matchup here of two top EMEA teams. This pick is from thinking FNATIC has the best roster of any team and they’ve had plenty of time to prepare and integrate their new players into the roster.

I think the flexibility of Boaster who has had solid performances on agents from Astra to KAY/O, opens up the rest of his team to play the agent they feel best on every map giving them a better map pool for a best of 5.

Finals

ALPHA vs. OMEGA

Matchup: Paper Rex vs. FNATIC

• The Pick: FNATIC

Both of these teams are very deserving of their first international championship, especially if they both make it through their grueling paths to this point. I think FNATIC takes it here due to the talent of their roster and being able to play in a variety of paces which Paper Rex struggled against when playing in the finals against FPX at Masters Copenhagen.

Alfajer will be the x factor here. This is because he will most likely play full time sentinel and will need to come up big in this series as he will be solo holding many areas and will have to absorb a lot of the Paper Rex pressure on both attack and defense. Although many regard him as a Raze player, he is a top tier Killjoy player and can definitely come up big in this series.

Finish

There you have it. No need to watch the games, sorry for the spoilers!

Anything can happen with this format and upsets will be more than likely to happen.

So to close this article we have a few dark horse teams that can make a run that aren’t the favorites of the tournament:

Leviatán

Finished last year strong and net upgraded their team and kept their same coach. They have the potential to beat any team in the field.

Giants Gaming

A new but solid roster. I think freeing Nukkye from IGL duties can potentially unlock him and allow him to take over some games against any team.

Team Vitality

In the events they have played thus far they look like they can be a surprise team this year. Unfortunately they will be most likely playing against another dark horse team in Leviatán in the second round.

Thanks for reading! For more content, check out the rest of our VALORANT articles and guides.