Another season of ESEA-IM is nearly in the books.  The finals are approaching, and it is once again time for the best teams that aren’t in invite to fight like gladiators for literal tens of dollars.  Who will win?  Who will not win?  Will bl4nk show up to claim yet another IM title?  Few of these questions will be answered, but I will try.


dog1 vs eL cLaSsIcO
micah [scout] air
saam [scout] wrech
liko [roam] connor
ranga [pocket] sneaky
rikachu [demo] chriz_tah_fah
cookiejake [medic] bear

dog1

	dog1 is the team that absolutely everyone expected to make this far.  They emerged early in the offseason as an eclectic mix of players from former high-IM teams, most from liko and the manlets.  The team had an initially rocky start, including a snakewater game where they were down 4-0 against Lil Chubby Ducks before mounting a fantastic five-round comeback cited by spectators as “pretty okay, I guess” and setting their path to a 16-0 regular season.  They have a combination of coordination and DM that certainly gives the “soon to be low-mid invite team” vibe, and their previous 5-2 dispatching of El Classico in the regular season lends credence to their ability to mop up IM with relative ease.  However, their journey to invite may have hit a setback; as it was recently discovered that star medic cookiejake had broken his arm while falling out of his bed, allegedly after hearing that Muma, up and coming demoman for Froyotech, was next on b4nny’s chopping block.

	Team contact saam had this to say about the situation:

 “Cookie has been the leader of our team all season, having taken a freshman course in team coordination from Dr. M. Overlord.  His ability on medic will be sorely missed in the match, but we have found a suitable substitute for the time being.”

	Insider sources say cookiejake will be joined for IM finals by up-and-coming mouse user cookiejake’s roommate alongside himself on the keyboard.  El Classico is expected to file a complaint to ESEA admins requesting the use of a permanent sentry to offset the 7v6 disadvantage they have.  There is no word yet as to if cookiejake’s roommate has ever actually played TF2.

	Despite this setback, dog1 is currently expected to roll El Classico in the IM finals and punch their ticket to ESEA-I S22.  They will make history as the first IM champion team to stay completely intact in their first season of invite, assuming cookiejake’s roommate is not cut for the arguably more-capable cookiejake’s left arm.





eL cLaSsIcO

	On the other side of the coin is El Classico (birth name eL cLaSsIcO).  The team is wrech’s latest in a series of efforts to desperately claw his way into invite, this time surrounding himself with another capable core of mouse-clickers.  Their season has been relatively cut-and-dry, only dropping   Drama arose halfway through the season when Nobel Prize in Literature laureate Dr. Mustard Overlord was cut from the team due to being “too good for them” (source: Dr. Overlord).

Team leader wrech spoke about Mustard’s performance:

	“We just had to cut him after he ended up sticky trapping our last spawn 5 times in one scrim.  Our team will be making a charitable donation to Colour Blind Awareness in hope that no demo main will ever end up at the wrong last ever again.”

	The Nobel Prize Committee responded to this event soonafter:

	“Us at the Nobel Prize Committee are shocked and disgusted by the events that have taken place in this season of ESEA-IM.  The Nobel Peace Prize for 2016 will be heavily favored to whomever can resolve this humanitarian crisis and reinstall Dr. Overlord as the rightful Pocket Soldier for Team Classic.”

	The Nobel Peace Prize for 2016 is expected to be unclaimed.

	Filling Mustard’s comically large shoes is sneaky, who has been making a capable case for top pocket in IM this season.  He has dropped similar numbers to Mustard throughout the season, although it is worth noting that eL cLaSsIcO will most likely lose the support of TFTV forums following the departure of Mustard.