Gumayusi Dominates a “Laughable” Statistic
When it comes to laning skills, maximizing champion strengths to dominate opponents, even in a weak lane, few can surpass Gumayusi in the professional League of Legends scene today, if not the T1 marksman being the best. Recently, according to statistics from the specialized site DPM, Gumayusi has the highest percentage of matches reaching level 6 earlier than his opponents among the top 10 marksmen with over 50%. Accordingly, Gumayusi’s figure stands at 68.1%.
This means that Gumayusi consistently demonstrates the ability to maximize each minion and each experience point, regardless of whether the match is dominated by T1 or the opponents. His laning skills are so strong that even when pressured, Gumayusi knows how to position himself to maximize his gains.
However, this brings up a problem: Gumayusi often finds himself alone in the bot lane. In reality, marksmen will level up to 6 slower than others in a team, unless they secure many kills and establish an early dominance. The reason is that they have to frequently share experience with the Support. But if a marksman levels up to 6 too quickly, it indicates that their Support is often absent from the bot lane during the early game.
Notably, the DPM leaderboard also clearly shows that Smash – the player chosen to replace Gumayusi during the 2025 LCK Cup and the start of the 2025 Regular Seasons – only has a 57.4% rate of leveling up to 6 before his opponents. The reason is that every time Smash plays, he cannot win his lane without a Support by his side.
Gumayusi’s Playstyle is Both the Strength and Weakness of T1
In fact, T1’s “win lane win game” playstyle has been strongly developed when they have two lanes capable of winning against the opponents while Faker maintains a balanced to winning position. But when Zeus left, and T1’s opponents showed superiority over Faker, relying solely on Gumayusi will be a weakness for T1. Especially as opponents recognize this strength and simply need to ban 3 to 4 of Gumayusi’s champions each match to neutralize him. Fearless Draft will help T1’s opponents manage the remaining champions.
The upcoming phase for T1 will be incredibly important, and they will need to address their weaknesses from recent times if they do not want to miss out on another international tournament in 2025.