Is APA the VILLAIN of the LCS?! BIG DIG SUMMER or JUST a FLING?! feat. Raz | Hotline League 325 

00:00:00 Intro 00:17:40 HyperButter's take: LCS content needs more villains to be successful 00:33:35 ANOTHER NEW SPONSOR!?! Welcome, PrizePicks! 00:44:42 Jim is getting back on board with LCS 01:03:45 Tyler's BIG DIG SUMMER 01:17:23 NZXT break! 01:21:53 Jake's take: Talk Your Split format is corny 01:54:58 KIA break! 01:59:44 Skizzle's take: the Summer Finals venue is one of the worst LCS decisions in a while 02:25:13 Outro

For the KIA ad with the EV9: drive around LA making a stop at each teams gaming house/training facility and briefly visit each team (or even just for the teams that are also sponsored by KIA)

Apa is not a villain, and it is Dig summer. Asked and answered, thank y’all for coming out tonight. Real talk though I don’t want to lose any two teams from the league. Gonna be a sad time.

Jim's call really resonated with me, as another returning fan who is excited about the changes and personalities in the league right now. And im the same way as a fan of the whole region!

This episode probably had the best callers. I really liked them all

"There are no bigger haters of the LCS than LCS fans." Preach. Holy moly I can't stand it. Who should get the spot? Another LPL or LCK team? If all you want to do is watch those teams, watch them the rest of the fucking year then! And Cubby is based. Fuck the LEC. If anyone deserves to lose a spot it's those hasbeens.

The first guy hating on APA and saying he gets carried but he legit carried some gamers already in summer split on corki lol

Firat caller doesn't actually watch the LCS and its content. That jensen and Inspired video they were not flaming each other. And APA has carried several games this split.

Travis has a dad confirmed

I Am so happy dude!!! BEEN A BEST OF 3 BEGGAR FOR YEARSSSSSSSSSSS. so happy to have real games in na now!!

Travis saying that we're in our villain era gave me serious boomer vibes lmao

god don jake is such a treasure

I wouldn’t say APA is the villain. FLY is the villain. APA is more like the wit of the league except without the wit.

I miss the one guy that used to hype up the dignitas academy mid laner, Gaaaah I cant remember their names. But his takes were always entertaining, much love to that guy

As the caller who brought up the issue of “LCS trying too hard with trash talk” last season, it absolutely is corny.

as a Bostonian the term "big dig" is traumatic

Travis getting a new sponsor every week is my new favorite meta

Watching Raz swallow a smile after hearing the town name in VA got me in tears. 😂 It’s either that or what he is watching on his other monitor but Idk. Impeccable timing. ❤ Raz one of the best analysts NA has and rightfully so. Him also saying he wants to be the last prediction and wants the boos from the crowd he knows competition and thrives in it. (Sorry for the glaze)

How is realizing that 66% of the teams we send to Worlds are worthless to the event being masochistic

Travis, I just bought a Kia K5 due to them sponsoring you :).

Does anyone know what the vid where Travis lists out all of NA's boomerang imports is called?

Please get a sponsored shirt since white is really not your color. Raz and Cubby carried the video for this episode. Can't wait for tonight! :3

i totally agree with travis about the "slap in the face" being a cliche in titals of articles. same with "slammed". just stop using verbs and start using adjectives when more substantial than a random ass word

I was at the Houston event and it has been my fav event Ive ever been too

I liked Raz before, but I LOVE Raz now. Dude's just hilarious.

Worth watching twice to get to see the vod thanks for the shout out cubby 👌

they should put more stuff to buy in the client store maybe if i seen a fitted hat of one of the champs that would looks cool on a hat i probably would have bought one by now my address and info is alrdy in there so why not

Really loved the episode this week, came close to bursting out laughing kn the middle of my office a couple times. Don Jake's eloquence was a hilarious juxtaposition to usual callers, made me feel like i was watching an LS stream when he came on.

what's the c word reference at 1:09:15 why is it banned in chat lmao

11:10 I mean... the United Center felt pretty full. Not like FULL full, but 12k+ of the 18,000 occupancy was being used. Probably closer to 15k ppl than 12k tbh

I will say, I watch the vods muted and at double speed. Then i watch the lcs segments that were funny or interesting

I am surprised about the prize picks sponsor, but get that bag!! Cool to see they added esports, but only gamble what you can afford to lose :)

Great surprise to have the Don Jake call in.

Sponsors keep travis channel alive… he loves people… people like this needs to stay visible

Thinking APA is a villain is mentally ill😂 dude has the biggest under dog story and has overcome more criticism than most people

I honestly thing fantasy LCS was better when it was on lolesports before it moved to sleeper op

They are not giving enough props to the europeans for enabeling the "Talk your split". Saying apa and jojo are saving the league for talking shit when neither of them was as direct about their opinions in interviews before inspired and bwipo started it is just a blast narrative.

First caller is delusional lol

01:21:53 LEGENDARY caller: He was straight cookin, especially that Onlyfans part lmao

Wouldn't Riot picking LA for the final have a lot do with lowering costs? Hauling equipment, stage elements to another state, by truck, airplane, maybe they have to rent equipment... Plane tickets, food and hotels for production staff, and whatever else... if everything is local they drive a truck with stuff to the venue and staff can go home to eat and sleep... also teams save on travel, food and lodging... If they are not selling out seats it could be a net loss on the event, no?

Amazing episode super unhinged LOL. Appreciated donjake's take don't fully agree but good conversation

That new DIG fan... I am so sorry.

I know they just joined, but I'm all for shopify and imt leaving if this is the new dig. I feel like teams usually go big right when they join to try to win over fans, but they just showed up, made a budget roster, and have been suckin ass. IMT almost had the first (and would still be the only) perfect regular split their first split. Honestly, I wish IMT was good because of the great lakes stuff and I liked them that first year, but they've just been suckin too much ass. But, if I were a betting man, I'd put money on IMT and 100t leaving.

If Apa was from eu he would be seen as a villan as much as inspired I think.

Travis typing the entire time lol

Hey, its me!

travis are you a fan of the south park magic episode?

Skizzle listened to Monte and Thoorin and came straight to HLL to repeat what they talked about on their shows.

jake the man lol

BIG DIG ENERGY

east coast/west coast thing is ridiculous. West coast has to eat timezone shit for literally everything and people on the east coast will still cry over the one thing we've got on the west. FOH lol

Dignitas is my favorite sidepiece #bigDIGsummer

"nope APA doesnt force the trash talk, he does it to hold himself accountable" -Cubby probably I think Cubby is shit at analysis and casting. I shit talk him to hold myself accountable.

This first caller is high out of his mind omg 18:20 lol I’m dying

50:55 Is lcs a trap?

@cubby is apa the Eli Manning of League of Legends

I made three PrizePicks Travis. If I lose my money do I blame you or NRG??

To the first caller: "If you want to trash talk, be as good as APA"

I don't watch twitch so I don't get to participate in these. But I really would want someone to really hammer home a question about the lcs fans complete lack of confidence in the league, franchise teams, and players. Them trying to spin the fact teams who they themselves are so unconfident in the success of this league that they are selling their slots for pennies on the dollar, their being no consequences for teams making no effort since franchising started, the fact that marks broom closet he lived in on team liquid is now the size of the venues for games, and not to mention it took the league basically collapsing for best of threes to finally come back and each team only plays one of them, the comment section on nearly every piece of Na League esport content is overwhelmingly negative, player trash talk did come back but since there is 0 consequences it all feels so fraudulent and fake. To be honest the perception is at such a low that anytime people start speaking about even one positive aspects of the lcs that they are disingenuous and ignoring the unbelievably massive flaws that it feels like anyone financially incentivized for the league to grow is trying to shove it all under a rug. Except its like trying to put an elephant under a rug everyone knows it's there.

Calling the callers by “caller” is hilariously insincere

Why sports gambling man…

bro says "varchester United" clearly doesn't watch football and gets his opinions from memes.

Travis Gafford try not to be condescending to callers challenge impossible.

second i guess

#bigdigsummer

first

APA is literally the best performing mid laner this split so far and the first caller comes in saying he's trash 😂 first caller is stuck in silver because of his teammates guaranteed

As a traditional sports fan, I appreciate Cubby's references. The fact that Travis is so negative towards it makes my personal viewing experience worse. It seriously detracted from the show overall. As a long time viewer, this might be the first time I just had to turn the episode off.

Begone Spotify and Immortals

The sports fantasy sponsorship is frankly disappointing to me as a very long term supporter and twitch prime sub. Sports gambling is gambling, and gambling is a public health crises.

I wish there were more calls on the actual games/gameplay. No I don't want to call in...

AC C h x

The callers were too annoying this episode. I dipped 40mins in I'm sorry.

Dude, I love your content, but sports gambling is not cool. They’re self aware enough to even have an addiction helpline that they’re funding

OK EVERYONE!!! FIRST CALLER HERE! -PIN THIS!!! let’s have a civil debate on why I genuinely think apa is trash. Comment below me. I’ll start off. Apa has carried some games this split, and he is looking like a player now, but I want to point out that Corejj is back in form compared to last year mid split, but that team looks ass when he isn’t making plays and pyosik carried them last year. I mainly don’t like apa bc he thinks he is better than everyone but he has no champ pool and got carried all last year. Last year what champs he play besides trist, Azir, ziggs, Taliyah, and asol where he was actually looking good and carrying games? (His 1 cass game was good I will say that)