This article is part of our DraftKings CS:GO series.
GAMES (EDT)
- 12:30 p.m. Vitality (+178) vs. fnatic (-221)
- 12:30 p.m. Complexity (+143) vs. NiP (-175)
- 12:30 p.m. Heretics (+484) vs. Astralis (-684)
- 4:00 p.m. Evil Geniuses (-208) vs. Gen.G (+168)
- 4:00 p.m. 100 Thieves (-191) vs. Cloud9 (+156)
Vitality (2–2) vs. fnatic (2–2)
Vitality head into their match against fnatic as the underdog after taking down Dignitas their last time out. ZywOo was unsurprisingly at the top of the scoreboard, and both apEX and misutaaa had good performances as well, with apEX being particularly impressive on Nuke. ZywOo is the fourth-highest priced player on the slate at $9,000, but the Frenchman is capable of putting points even in a loss, as we saw at DreamHack Masters Malmo last year when he put up 82 kills and a plus-22 K/D differential across three maps in a loss to fnatic.
fnatic are coming in with a win of their own against Heretics, and Brollan was dominant for the Swedes, putting up 79 frags, 12 assists with a plus-27 K/D differential. While it is questionable if Brollan should be priced this highly, there are enough good lower-priced options on the slate that we can fit him on a roster if we want. KRIMZ has been in poor form recently, and online has never really been where he shines the most, but it is definitely tempting to roster him when he is priced behind both Brollan and flusha. JW is one of many interesting plays in the $6,000–$7,000 range, and he is worth
GAMES (EDT)
- 12:30 p.m. Vitality (+178) vs. fnatic (-221)
- 12:30 p.m. Complexity (+143) vs. NiP (-175)
- 12:30 p.m. Heretics (+484) vs. Astralis (-684)
- 4:00 p.m. Evil Geniuses (-208) vs. Gen.G (+168)
- 4:00 p.m. 100 Thieves (-191) vs. Cloud9 (+156)
Vitality (2–2) vs. fnatic (2–2)
Vitality head into their match against fnatic as the underdog after taking down Dignitas their last time out. ZywOo was unsurprisingly at the top of the scoreboard, and both apEX and misutaaa had good performances as well, with apEX being particularly impressive on Nuke. ZywOo is the fourth-highest priced player on the slate at $9,000, but the Frenchman is capable of putting points even in a loss, as we saw at DreamHack Masters Malmo last year when he put up 82 kills and a plus-22 K/D differential across three maps in a loss to fnatic.
fnatic are coming in with a win of their own against Heretics, and Brollan was dominant for the Swedes, putting up 79 frags, 12 assists with a plus-27 K/D differential. While it is questionable if Brollan should be priced this highly, there are enough good lower-priced options on the slate that we can fit him on a roster if we want. KRIMZ has been in poor form recently, and online has never really been where he shines the most, but it is definitely tempting to roster him when he is priced behind both Brollan and flusha. JW is one of many interesting plays in the $6,000–$7,000 range, and he is worth taking a chance on because he has been among the top performers in the last three meetings with Vitality.
- Vitality Players to Target: ZywOo ($9,000)
- fnatic Players to Target: Brollan ($9,600), KRIMZ ($8,200), JW ($6,800)
Complexity (1–3) vs. NiP (3–1)
NiP are coming off a loss to Astralis, and they will hope to bounce back against a Complexity side that has looked shoddy recently. With both teams likely to stick to their permabans, NiP will have the option of going towards Overpass, where they have defeated the likes of Astralis and fnatic, and Inferno, which they have a 71.4 percent win rate on. It is incredibly difficult to predict who will show up on the side of NiP, but Plopski is the guy that feels the most reliable, and he ranks quite well across all the maps that we are likely to end up on. It is well worth noting that twist has been an absolute machine on Overpass, posting a plus-58 K/D differential on the map, with great performances against the likes of ENCE and fnatic. However, he plays as a B site anchor on Mirage, which definitely hurts his value a bit.
Complexity finally got a win after taking down ENCE, and they will look to find an upset here against NiP. We should see Mirage, unless someone throws a curveball in the map veto, and it has always been a great map for blameF, who leads his team with 0.79 kills/round and a 1.34 K/D ratio on the map. Bizarrely, Mirage has always been a rough map for poizon, despite the fact that it sets up quite favorably for AWPers, and while I would normally recommend against rostering a guy like k0nfig when he is priced above poizon, the set of maps that we are likely to see certainly favors him. Interestingly, RUSH has performed way above his normal level on both Mirage and Overpass, posting 0.70 kills/round and a 1.13 K/D ratio across 637 rounds on these maps, making him a sneaky, albeit risky, sleeper pick at just $4,600.
- Complexity Players to Target: blameF ($6,200), k0nfig ($8,000), RUSH ($4,600)
- NiP Players to Target: Plopski ($7,400)
Heretics (3–1) vs. Astralis (3–1)
Heretics are coming off their first loss of the tournament, and they will be underdogs against an Astralis side that is coming off a 2–1 victory against NiP. Interestingly, these two teams favor a similar set of maps, so we should end up on maps where both teams are comfortable. Maka has been a monster for Heretics, but he finally cooled off a bit in their most recent loss to fnatic. Instead, it was ScreaM's younger brother, Nivera, who was at the top of the scoreboard alongside xms. This is a very tough matchup for Heretics, so rostering any of their players is a risk, but if you want to go there, both Nivera and Maka are solid plays.
On the side of Astralis, device and Magisk are still the safest plays. Xyp9x has been super solid in the last few months as well. While I hated dupreeh last week, he is a bit more likely to put up points here, with some potential of having a great performance if Heretics decide to go towards Dust2.
- Heretics Players to Target: Maka ($8,400), Nivera ($7,200)
- Astralis Players to Target: device ($9,400), Magisk ($8,600), Xyp9x/dupreeh ($7,800/$7,600)
Evil Geniuses (2–2) vs. Gen.G (3–1)
Evil Geniuses had no issues dealing with Triumph, and they will be looking for a crucial win against a Gen.G side that is coming off their first loss of the tournament. EG's trio of Brehze, CeRq and Ethan all had a good game against Triumph, with Ethan ending the series particularly strong on Nuke, and they will need to replicate that performance against Gen.G if they want to have a chance at making playoffs. CeRq is definitely great value at $7,400, and Brehze is worth considering despite the high salary.
koosta had a bit of an off game against Cloud9, but he has been Gen.G's most consistent performer and should definitely be considered alongside autimatic and BnTeT if you think that Gen.G can compete.
- Evil Geniuses Players to Target: Brehze ($9,200), CeRq ($7,400)
- Gen.G Players to Target: koosta ($7,000), autimatic/BnTeT ($6,800/$7,000)
Cloud9 (3–1) vs. 100 Thieves (3–1)
Cloud9 are coming in hot after a great performance against Gen.G, but they will be a slight underdog against a 100 Thieves team that just made a coaching change. The trio of oSee, floppy and Sonic all had great games against Gen.G, and they are all solid options Saturday. Sonic looked particularly impressive against Gen.G, and the maps set up quite well for him.
With both Train and/or Inferno being likely, jks should definitely be considered for 100 Thieves. The Aussie leads his team with a K/D ratio of 1.18 with 0.71 kills/round across these two maps, and his team usually relies on him to put up the numbers. If you want to target a 100 Thieves win, jkaem is also worth considering. His aggressive style of play makes him inconsistent when it comes to fantasy scoring, but his upside makes him a nice GPP option.
