Riot Games’ David “Phreak” Turley has never been one to shy away from bold predictions. The League of Legends play-by-play caster has made many contentious claims in the past, but that’s not to say he’s always wrong — just last summer, Phreak predicted 100 Thieves to win the 2021 LCS Championship before a single game was played in the Summer Split.

Phreak has been casting League of Legends for over a decade, and it’s fair to say that his predictions, correct or incorrect, are from the perspective of a seasoned veteran who has watched thousands of competitive LoL matches.

Before the start of the 2022 LCS Spring Split, Phreak sat down with Inven Global to share his bold predictions for the rest of the season. Now that the LCS Spring Split is at its mid-point, let’s see how Phreak’s bold predictions are shaping up in reality and which ones have come to pass. 

1: Evil Geniuses to the moon

Phreak had previously stated during the 2022 LCS Lock In that he expected Evil Geniuses to win the whole thing, and for good reason — EG didn’t drop a single game on their way to the finals. However, EG ended up losing 3-0 to Team Liquid, who have now one both of the Lock In tournaments in LCS history. Despite their loss in the finals of the LCS Lock In, Phreak expressed confidence in Evil Geniuses before the start of the Spring Split.

“I was wrong because I said EG was going to win the 2022 LCS Lock In, but I'm still picking EG to win the LCS,” Phreak said, before taking it a step further. “I did say EG was winning Worlds 2022 —I'm less confident now, but who am I if I don't stick to my guns? Evil Geniuses are winning Worlds 2022.”

This would be a bold prediction even if EG was dominating the LCS Spring Split in similar fashion to their Lock In form, but that could not be further from the truth. Halfway through the Spring Split, EG is in a three-way tie for 6th place with a record of 4-5. EG is certainly a better team than their current standing, and it’s far too early to judge a team’s full-season trajectory, but EG’s missteps in the first third of the Spring Split have been unexpected, to say the least.

2: Cloud9 will miss Worlds 2022

In addition to Evil Geniuses winning the LCS, Phreak also put Team Liquid and 100 Thieves as the frontrunners for the 2nd and 3rd seeds for North American representation at the 2022 World Championship. This would exclude Cloud9, who has qualified for Worlds eight of the last nine years, out of the international picture for this season.

“I know LS said it's a failure if Cloud9 don't win both splits and it's a failure if Cloud9 don't top 4 at Worlds 2022, but they're not even going. Sorry LS, but this squad isn't going to reach top 3. We already picked our three teams and you're getting 4th place, which is worse than C9 did last year,” Phreak stated bluntly. “It's unlucky, but I don't mean this as an insult. I don't dislike LS in any way, but I've already made my calls.”

Phreak made this prediction before Cloud9’s release of Nick “LS” De Cesare and Max Waldo’s subsequent promotion to head coach, and after C9’s 3-0 superweek, Phreak has already admitted his initial prediction was wrong after a Player of the Week performance from top laner Park “Summit” Woo-tae.

3: LCS Spring Playoffs picture

Here's a look at where Phreak predicted the teams competing in the LCS would finish by the end of the Spring Split:

Here are the current standings halfway through the LCS Spring Split:

Phreak has generally had a proper read on how the split has played out so far, with a few exceptions of course in Evil Geniuses and FlyQuest. However, with half of the season still left to play, there is more than enough time for EG to play back up to expectations, as well as time for FLY to start losing steam after a hot start to the Spring Split highlighted by immaculate mid lane play by rookie Loïc "toucouille" Dubois was most recently followed by an 0-3 superweek. 

4: T1 will win MSI 2022 and Faker will not retire until he wins five World Championships

Nearly one full month ago, Phreak had T1 not just winning the 2022 LCK Spring Playoffs, but going to the Mid-Season Invitational and winning that, too. It's too cool, I don't know - I'm doing this only because of hype reasons,” Phreak admitted. “It's not pure analysis, to be clear, but who cares? It's a bold prediction. Faker's going to win another MSI and he's going to further cement himself as the greatest League player of all time and no one else will still be close.”

Analysis be damned, Phreak sure looks right about T1 so far. The young squad led by veteran mid laner Lee “Faker” Sang-hyeok has not lost a match this season and have only dropped two individual games throughout the process of dominating the LCK. Reflecting in wonder upon Faker’s career as the definitive greatest League of Legends player of all time, Phreak pondered upon what would be satisfying enough for Faker to hang up the mouse and keyboard for the last time.

“The fact that Faker is still...jeez, it's almost like you can't make a prediction too bold in context of Faker's career. He'll be the first player to win four World Championships? Yeah, that's not a bold take,” said Phreak. “That's just probably what's going to happen, so I'm kind of excited for that and the fact that Faker is still this amazing. It's the tenth year of his career and he's still the best? He's on an undefeated team? That's ridiculous.”

5: Uzi’s best days are behind him

League of Legends esports fans the world over were delighted to hear that legendary Chinese AD carry Jian "Uzi" Zi-Hao would be coming out of retirement to join Bilibili Gaming.

However, AD carry Chiu "Doggo" Tzu-Chuan has started all but two games in the 2022 LPL Spring Split thus far, and even in the ones Uzi has played in, he has not looked like his old self.

It was expected that Uzi would not be playing every game of the season, and it was also expected that Uzi would need some time to ramp up, but Phreak thinks it is unlikely that Uzi will ever reclaim his peak form: “My instinct is that he's not going to just return to greatness. He's not just going to take over the league. I'm not sold it's going to be the same Uzi we had before.”

Two games is not enough for Uzi to be properly evaluated at this point in his career, but the fact that Doggo has been playing the lion’s share of matches and is a young, rising star in the international League of Legends competitive scene after breaking out in the PCS might say more than the two matches alone in terms of Uzi’s ceiling in 2022.