The regular season of Mobile Legends: Bang Bang Pro League Indonesia Season 12 has come to an end with a surprise from Alter Ego and Evos Legends, who failed to retain their spots to the playoffs. Despite fielding squads that were considered strong enough for local competition, both of them eventually struggled after the two-week break and plummeted to the bottom of the MPL ID standings.
Alter Ego finished ninth with 10 defeats from 16 matches and will miss the playoffs for the first time in their MPL ID career. This result was obviously surprising given that they had made multiple changes prior to the end of the S12 competition, including the signing of veteran Gustian “Rekt” Hidayat for a tremendous transfer fee.
Meanwhile, Evos Legends experienced deja vu this season by finishing in seventh place. This is the second time the iconic team has failed to make the playoffs, having previously struggled in MPL ID Season 10 in 2022.
Expectations have reached a new low and are likely to remain so unless they find a solution to the ongoing issue in the management team. After key players like Dalvin “Hijumee” Putra and Rizqi “Saykots” Iskandar were sent to the MLBB Development League and Filipino star Gerard “Dlar” Trinchera left as a free agent, the majority of their fans took to social media to vent their frustrations and demand changes to the coaching staff.
On the other hand, pundits contend that Geek Fam and Dewa United will surprise viewers in the upcoming playoffs. Despite struggling in the first two weeks, Geek was able to take advantage of the two-week break and showed substantial improvements to secure a spot in the upper bracket playoffs for the first time. During the regular season, the distinctive pair of Filipino Allen “Baloyskie” Baloy and newcomer Mohammad “Cadeera” Dwi Chandra was acknowledged as Geek’s main pieces.
The newcomer Dewa United must be pleased to see their players overturning the negative trend from the first half of Season 12 and increasing their intensity to flourish in the last week of the regular season. After spending a while at the bottom of the rankings, they finally caught up with Bigetron Alpha and Rebellion Zion, all of whom finished with 7 wins out of 16 rounds.
The battle, however, is far from over for these teams, as they must take advantage of their next two-week break to figure out a way to beat the beasts, Onic Esports and Team RRQ. Even though they both ended the regular season in top place, their track records suggest that they still have weaknesses that their opponents may be able to exploit.
