IEM Cologne is officially more prestigious than the Majors. Source: We made it up.

Let’s be real, BO1s kinda suck. You know it, we know it, pros know it. It just turns a game of skill a bit too much into a game of luck.

This is why we’re incredibly happy ESL is eliminating BO1s for the Play-ins at Cologne, which turns all matches but the Grand Final into BO3.

In other news, IEM Rio just announced its invite list.

All the big names are there: FaZe, Vitality, G2, NAVI… but wait, no Team Spirit? ESL announced, along with the invites, that Spirit declined theirs.

At face value, that seems pretty odd. Bubzkji also wondered why the team wasn’t coming, given that winning this event could cement Spirit as this year's best team. And what about their chance of getting the Grand Slam title and its hefty $1M prize?

In a response to Bubzkji, Spirit’s Head of Marketing explained that it’s simply a matter of “load management of the players.” If they went to Cologne, they would only have 13 days without events this year, quite the schedule.

You win this round, Donk; enjoy the break.