Seven Fun Facts You May Not Know About OpTic's Mid Laner, Crown

OpTic Crown continues his run to aim for the LCS 2019 throne.

OpTic Gaming have extended their winning streak to 4 up to week 2. Their mid laner, Min-ho “Crown” Lee has been named MVP for the entire 4 games OpTic played this Summer which is quite different compared to their run at the beginning of last Spring. Riot Games also announced Crown as the 2019 LCS Summer Split Player of the Week 2.

The stats he displayed during the last four games were simply phenomenal. He was on a 16 KDA; he dealt 511 damage per minute and was responsible for 36.2% of the total damage dealt for his team. After finishing his adjustments in the LCS last split, he has been proving his prowess game after game in this Summer.

Another reason that makes him such a great player is that he’s been playing for the LCS and the OpTic Acadamy team. Crown had to fill in for the mid laner for their Acadamy, Scalet - who hasn’t been performing due to visa issues - and delivered exceptional performance. He carried both OpTic teams to a 6W-1L record.

Although he won the 2017 World Championship during his Samsung Galaxy days and proved his abilities in international stages several times, most fans did not give recognition to how much of a great player he was.

With this former Worlds champion looking to have finished his adjustments in the LCS, Inven Global gathered up some fun facts that you may not know about Crown.

1 - Crown made his debut as a Starcraft player

Crown was a Starcraft pro. He began his career as a Zerg player and was drafted by STX Soul in March 2011. His career as a Starcraft player wasn’t that notable compared to his League career. After resigning from STX Soul, he remained as a Starcraft streamer for a while. However, he received a permanent ban for playing an R-rated Starcraft Use Map during a live stream.

After retiring as a Starcraft player, he started to play League of Legends. Crown soon joined Samsung Galaxy in 2015. Edgar, the former head coach of Samsung Galaxy and also a former Starcraft player like Crown, picked him for the starting mid laner of the team. However, at that time he was known as one of the team’s weaknesses with their top laner, CuVee.

2 - Crown performed in the Brazilian League

A fact that even the Brazilian league fans are sometimes unaware of is that Crown once performed in the Brazilian League. Before he Joined Samsung Galaxy, he was a player for Team 58ers, and KaBum! throughout June - December 2014. Numerous Korean imports were performing such as Olleh, Emperor, Winged, and Daydream back then. Crown did not receive positive recognition compared to what the other imports received in Brazil. He eventually went back to Korea after performing for six months.

3 - Crown is a hard-worker

The unbelievably large number of solo queues Crown played was a big issue in 2015. During the first year Crown joined Samsung Galaxy in 2015, he played 4,000 solo queues. This means that he had to play League without sleeping, eating, and doing absolutely nothing. A fun fact: if you sum up his total playing time in solo queue, you can use Ignite 111,010 times, Flash 66,606 times, and Cleanse 83,238 times.

Pro players normally play 20 to 30 games a week during a split. If a pro played 30 games of solo queue, it means that he could play approximately 540 games a year. So, technically, Crown played about eight times more than the number of solo queues pros usually play in a year. Considering that he had to also perform in the regular split and team scrims, the number he displayed simply does not make any sense.

4 - Crown dislikes Malzahar

Malzahar is a signature champion for Crown. In 2017, Crown played Malzahar six times in Worlds and won every game single game on him. Him using Malzahar three times against Faker in the finals was something to watch. He proved multiple times that his Malzahar was on another level to the esports fans.

Surprisingly, Crown did not pick Malzahar as his World Championship skin in 2017; he picked Taliya instead. During an interview Crown did right after Samsung won Worlds, he told that he preferred to pick another champion instead of Malzahar. Although his preference, it is told that Edgar actually recommended him to pick Malzahar. He thought that Malzahar is rather weak in laning but becomes significantly strong in teamfights.

Despite the fact that Crown won Worlds using Malzahar, he was dominated by Faker in the laning phase. As a matter of fact, “Faker’s performance” received more attention among Korean fans than "Crown’s sacrifice" during the Finals. That’s why most fans did not name him as the best mid laner of the year… Crown stated that he had to go through some hard times even though he won the 2017 Worlds.

5 - Crown is known for his weak mentality

According to Edgar, Crown had the weakest mentality in the team. Crown was so sensitive that his teammate, Ambition needed to take intense care of him. His weak mentality was also one of the reasons he underperformed at Worlds in 2018.

CoreJJ, who once played with Crown, stated that NA is probably the best region for him to perform since he would receive less mental stress. And, as his former support expected, Crown adjusted well to the NA culture and his performance has been skyrocketing.