|
Imagine if there's a Player of the Year award each year like MVP in NBA or Ballon d'Or in soccer, who would it be for each year?
TL used to published a series of overall review/awards of the year until 2019, and the winners were: (there were actually two awards, one for international and one for Korean players, but I am picking Korean player before 2018)
2011: Mvp
2012: Life
2013: Taeja
2014: Zest
2015: Life
2016 is actually missing, but I guess most people can agree it's Byun
2017: Innovation
2018: Serral
2019: Dark
And then it ends, so the rest is up for debate.
2020 contenders: Rogue (IEM Katowice and GSL) Reynor (2 DH EU and one DH season finals title, and Douyu Cup) TY (2 GSL) I am picking Rogue, but Reynor is close
2021 contenders: (Edited) Trap (DH Last Chance, two GSL ST, NeXT 2021, TSL 7) Reynor (IEM Katowice, DH season finals) Serral (DH season finals, DH EU, NexT 2021) Rogue (GSL Code S and ST, TSL 8) Maru (DH season finals, KoB2, ROG 2021) At first I was think Maru, but after discussion with JJH777, I now think Trap should be winner of 2021.
2022 contenders: Serral (IEM Katowice, Homestory XXI, TSL9) Maru (DH Last Chance, GSL) I think it's Serral by a healthy margin
2023 contenders: Serral (ESL EU Summer, ESL Summer, MC6, ESL EU Winter) Maru (2 GSL) I am picking Serral again, even if he fumbled the Katowice and Gamers8, he was damn near invincible in all other tournaments of the year, posting some of most ridiculous numbers in his career.
Are you happy with TL's pick before 2020? What's your pick on the winners from 2020 to now?
|
I'd go Maru over Serral in 2018 because 3 GSLs and WESG is more impressive than Blizzcon and GSL vs the World and region locked tournaments barely weigh in at all. I also think that's consistent with the logic that put Innovation over Rogue in 2017. From a format and player pool perspective GSL was harder to win than world championships back then. I'd still rate the world championships higher than GSL due to the prize pool but imo it's only like a 2:1.5 ratio at best in favor of Blizzcon and that's not enough for Serral to come out ahead. Considering that WESG is more impressive than GSL vs the World the only way to have Serral come out ahead is if you think a Blizzcon is worth 3 2018 GSLs by itself which is pretty crazy given the history of how rare repeat winners were in GSL before Maru. I also think it's relevant that Maru was the only Terran in the ro8 of 2/4 of those events he won while Serral had other Zergs in the ro8 and usually even the ro4 in all of the events he won.
Besides that I agree with most of what you put though I think you're sleeping on Trap for 2021. Though it doesn't help that his impressive results were near cleanly split between 2020 and 2021.
After checking Traps results again I think it's him in 2021 and it's not even really close. Victories in Last chance, TSL, 2 super tournaments, Next, and a bunch of 2nd places.
|
On March 31 2024 05:59 JJH777 wrote: I'd go Maru over Serral in 2018 because 3 GSLs and WESG is more impressive than Blizzcon and GSL vs the World and region locked tournaments barely weigh in at all. I also think that's consistent with the logic that put Innovation over Rogue in 2017. From a format and player pool perspective GSL was harder to win than world championships back then. I'd still rate the world championships higher than GSL due to the prize pool but imo it's only like a 2:1.5 ratio at best in favor of Blizzcon and that's not enough for Serral to come out ahead. Considering that WESG is more impressive than GSL vs the World the only way to have Serral come out ahead is if you think a Blizzcon is worth 3 2018 GSLs by itself which is pretty crazy given the history of how rare repeat winners were in GSL before Maru. I also think it's relevant that Maru was the only Terran in the ro8 of 2/4 of those events he won while Serral had other Zergs in the ro8 and usually even the ro4 in all of the events he won.
Besides that I agree with most of what you put though I think you're sleeping on Trap for 2021. Though it doesn't help that his impressive results were near cleanly split between 2020 and 2021.
After checking Traps results again I think it's him in 2021 and it's not even really close. Victories in Last chance, TSL, 2 super tournaments, Next, and a bunch of 2nd places.
I checked again and I agree on picking Trap in 2021. I forgot how impressive that one year stretch was, especially considering Protoss' relative weaker performance in big tournaments last few years.
2018 is especially a hard one because if either one of Serral and Maru didn't exist, people would've considered their 2018 to be by far the greatest peak year of anyone ever. But we somehow have both of their crazy stretches overlapped in 2018.
Maru's WESG and 3 GSL is probably a little more impressive on paper than Serral's 3 EU WCS, GSL vs World, WCS grand finals and Homestory XVIII, but I will still argue for Serral for the following reason:
- Serral was literally invincible in second half of 2018 in offline events, went 43-0 in series record, including 15 straight series win against top Korean players.
-The offline match record against Korean players overall in 2018: 22-4 (85%) for Serral, 27-10 (73%) for Maru
- the historic significance of having a foreign player that didn't grew up in Korean Esports infrastructure won world champion over Koreans for the first time ever, and in convincing fashion. This was legit one of the biggest news of SC2 history. Looking back, now everyone just kinda remember 2018 to be the year of Serral. I really can't pick any other player that year.
|
Think 2018 is pretty safe to give to Serral: Yes, Maru won three GSLs, but even if we consider them "lesser tournaments": No one before has dominated the foreign scene in that way either. And if you look at international tournaments that year: Whenever Serral and Maru participated, Serral performed equal or better than Maru except for WESG. Combined with the World Championship that year...it definetly is Serral.
2020 is a bit tricky since there is no "official World Championship" that year to break the tie. Rogue winning the next best thing should put him ahead though.
2021 is also a bit tricky: I was going between Trap and Reynor, but ultimately decided for Reynor, simply because of the World Championship, which included a win over Maru in the Semis after Maru demolished Rogue one round earlier.
2022 is Serral, not much discussion there.
2023 is super-interesting, because both players who won the big bucks that year (Reynor and Oliveira) had otherwise no noteworthy performances. So I would give it to Serral again, but it is a very slight margine.
|
|
Gonna say that Fruitdealer is my pick for player of the year in 2010. He won the first ever GSL Code S, and he did it with Zerg which at the time was considered a completely not viable race for the pros (IMO this narrative had way more to do with the early map pool than the race itself but that's 20/20 hindsight). Not only did he win but he won in style utilizing Baneling drops notably. He still to date has one of the best if not the best rags to riches SC2 underdog stories the game has ever seen.
I think both the fact that the first GSL was extremely hyped both in Korea and abroad, and the fact that Fruitdealer completely changed the narrative about how the game was balanced, makes him the 2010 player of the year.
|
Also 2023's Player of the Year goes to Oliveira IMO. Even if IEM Katowice was all he won, that victory was massively impactful for a variety of reasons. What it meant to the SC2 community in China, how badass it was as an underdog story, all of the massive media buzz that surrounded it.
That tournament run was 5x as memorable as any of the tournament runs that have come since.
|
On March 31 2024 05:59 JJH777 wrote: I'd go Maru over Serral in 2018 because 3 GSLs and WESG is more impressive than Blizzcon and GSL vs the World and region locked tournaments barely weigh in at all. I also think that's consistent with the logic that put Innovation over Rogue in 2017. From a format and player pool perspective GSL was harder to win than world championships back then. I'd still rate the world championships higher than GSL due to the prize pool but imo it's only like a 2:1.5 ratio at best in favor of Blizzcon and that's not enough for Serral to come out ahead. Considering that WESG is more impressive than GSL vs the World the only way to have Serral come out ahead is if you think a Blizzcon is worth 3 2018 GSLs by itself which is pretty crazy given the history of how rare repeat winners were in GSL before Maru. I also think it's relevant that Maru was the only Terran in the ro8 of 2/4 of those events he won while Serral had other Zergs in the ro8 and usually even the ro4 in all of the events he won.
Besides that I agree with most of what you put though I think you're sleeping on Trap for 2021. Though it doesn't help that his impressive results were near cleanly split between 2020 and 2021.
After checking Traps results again I think it's him in 2021 and it's not even really close. Victories in Last chance, TSL, 2 super tournaments, Next, and a bunch of 2nd places.
Even though I agree with you that Maru on the whole was more successful than Serral was in more actual events that year. Serral's 2018 Blizzcon win was the long anticipated "Foreigner Win" that people had been hoping for since SC2 first released. To this day it's still Serral's biggest legacy achievement. It was also the last of the actually good Blizzcon tournaments.
I'd be willing to say he deserves the nod for player of the year that year.
|
Canada8784 Posts
Lol, imagine thinking TaeJa wasn't the player of the year every year
|
On March 31 2024 10:27 Nakajin wrote: Lol, imagine thinking TaeJa wasn't the player of the year every year
Actually, I think that PirateTerran was probably the player of the year every year, though MustacheTerran and TeamLiquidSucksBallsWithoutMe had a decent claim to dispute that in 2016 and 2018, respectively.
|
On March 31 2024 10:10 Vindicare605 wrote:Show nested quote +On March 31 2024 05:59 JJH777 wrote: I'd go Maru over Serral in 2018 because 3 GSLs and WESG is more impressive than Blizzcon and GSL vs the World and region locked tournaments barely weigh in at all. I also think that's consistent with the logic that put Innovation over Rogue in 2017. From a format and player pool perspective GSL was harder to win than world championships back then. I'd still rate the world championships higher than GSL due to the prize pool but imo it's only like a 2:1.5 ratio at best in favor of Blizzcon and that's not enough for Serral to come out ahead. Considering that WESG is more impressive than GSL vs the World the only way to have Serral come out ahead is if you think a Blizzcon is worth 3 2018 GSLs by itself which is pretty crazy given the history of how rare repeat winners were in GSL before Maru. I also think it's relevant that Maru was the only Terran in the ro8 of 2/4 of those events he won while Serral had other Zergs in the ro8 and usually even the ro4 in all of the events he won.
Besides that I agree with most of what you put though I think you're sleeping on Trap for 2021. Though it doesn't help that his impressive results were near cleanly split between 2020 and 2021.
After checking Traps results again I think it's him in 2021 and it's not even really close. Victories in Last chance, TSL, 2 super tournaments, Next, and a bunch of 2nd places. Even though I agree with you that Maru on the whole was more successful than Serral was in more actual events that year. Serral's 2018 Blizzcon win was the long anticipated "Foreigner Win" that people had been hoping for since SC2 first released. To this day it's still Serral's biggest legacy achievement. It was also the last of the actually good Blizzcon tournaments. I'd be willing to say he deserves the nod for player of the year that year. But is the player of the year award about having the coolest storyline or about actually being the best player? otherwise might as well make soO player of the year 2019 and Oliveira 2023.
|
On March 31 2024 09:23 Balnazza wrote: Think 2018 is pretty safe to give to Serral: Yes, Maru won three GSLs, but even if we consider them "lesser tournaments": No one before has dominated the foreign scene in that way either. And if you look at international tournaments that year: Whenever Serral and Maru participated, Serral performed equal or better than Maru except for WESG. Combined with the World Championship that year...it definetly is Serral.
That's a weird way of phrasing it considering they had both participated in 4 tournaments together. 1 time Maru did better, one time they lost in the same round and 2 times Serral did better. But when Serral did better he didn't have to face Maru, whereas Maru beat Serral 3-0 in the tournament where he did better
|
On March 31 2024 11:17 Charoisaur wrote:Show nested quote +On March 31 2024 10:10 Vindicare605 wrote:On March 31 2024 05:59 JJH777 wrote: I'd go Maru over Serral in 2018 because 3 GSLs and WESG is more impressive than Blizzcon and GSL vs the World and region locked tournaments barely weigh in at all. I also think that's consistent with the logic that put Innovation over Rogue in 2017. From a format and player pool perspective GSL was harder to win than world championships back then. I'd still rate the world championships higher than GSL due to the prize pool but imo it's only like a 2:1.5 ratio at best in favor of Blizzcon and that's not enough for Serral to come out ahead. Considering that WESG is more impressive than GSL vs the World the only way to have Serral come out ahead is if you think a Blizzcon is worth 3 2018 GSLs by itself which is pretty crazy given the history of how rare repeat winners were in GSL before Maru. I also think it's relevant that Maru was the only Terran in the ro8 of 2/4 of those events he won while Serral had other Zergs in the ro8 and usually even the ro4 in all of the events he won.
Besides that I agree with most of what you put though I think you're sleeping on Trap for 2021. Though it doesn't help that his impressive results were near cleanly split between 2020 and 2021.
After checking Traps results again I think it's him in 2021 and it's not even really close. Victories in Last chance, TSL, 2 super tournaments, Next, and a bunch of 2nd places. Even though I agree with you that Maru on the whole was more successful than Serral was in more actual events that year. Serral's 2018 Blizzcon win was the long anticipated "Foreigner Win" that people had been hoping for since SC2 first released. To this day it's still Serral's biggest legacy achievement. It was also the last of the actually good Blizzcon tournaments. I'd be willing to say he deserves the nod for player of the year that year. But is the player of the year award about having the coolest storyline or about actually being the best player? otherwise might as well make soO player of the year 2019 and Oliveira 2023.
I personally define "player of the year" as being the player that is most remembered for that year. Byun for 2016 is a perfect example, EVERYONE remembers 2016 as being Byun's year, but people remember him only for 1 win really and that was his Code S title.
If you just want to tally up who won the most titles, you can do that without giving that player a special title. Just tally up their wins and be done with it.
But if you want to call someone the "Player of the Year" I think there's more to it than that. And yea I would say that Oliveira is 2023's player of the year (I have to edit my previous post since I misplaced that win in 2022) and I would definitely say that soO has a good case for owning 2019, but so does Dark. Both of those wins were HUGE for their legacies.
|
GSL did used to do these kinds of awards.
Here's the ones from 2011.
Best Match: MMA vs Mvp Game 5 - GSL October Finals
Most Improved Player of Each Race: MMA (T), Leenock (Z), HuK (P)
Best Ceremony: AcE (Don't remember which one but it would have been in GSTL)
Special Award for promoting eSports: Tasteless and Artosis
Best K-Pop Girl Group: T-ara
Most Popular Player: NesTea
Most Popular Team: SlayerS
Best Coach: IM Coach Kang Dong-Hoon (lmao what? I guess it's cause he produced the most top players but he was the worst GSTL coach ever)
Best Players of each race: Mvp (T), NesTea (Z), MC (P)
Best Player (decided by the winner of the 2011 Blizzard Cup): MMA
And the ones from 2012
Best Match: Mvp vs Squirtle - Code S Season 2 Finals
Outstanding Player of Each Race: TaeJa (T), PartinG (P), Life (Z)
Best Ceremony: Seed
Special Award for promoting eSports: NaDa and Hot6iX
Best Rookie: Life
Most Popular Team: Incredible Miracle
Most Popular Player: Mvp
Best Coach: FXO Coach Choya
Best Player of Each Race: Mvp (T), Seed (P), Sniper (Z)
Best Player (Winner of 2012 Blizzard Cup: Life
And finally the ones from 2013 which I think are the last ones they did?
Best Zerg: RorO
Best Terran: Maru
Best Protoss: Dear
Best Rookie: Dear
|
On March 31 2024 08:32 Nasigil1 wrote:Show nested quote +On March 31 2024 05:59 JJH777 wrote: I'd go Maru over Serral in 2018 because 3 GSLs and WESG is more impressive than Blizzcon and GSL vs the World and region locked tournaments barely weigh in at all. I also think that's consistent with the logic that put Innovation over Rogue in 2017. From a format and player pool perspective GSL was harder to win than world championships back then. I'd still rate the world championships higher than GSL due to the prize pool but imo it's only like a 2:1.5 ratio at best in favor of Blizzcon and that's not enough for Serral to come out ahead. Considering that WESG is more impressive than GSL vs the World the only way to have Serral come out ahead is if you think a Blizzcon is worth 3 2018 GSLs by itself which is pretty crazy given the history of how rare repeat winners were in GSL before Maru. I also think it's relevant that Maru was the only Terran in the ro8 of 2/4 of those events he won while Serral had other Zergs in the ro8 and usually even the ro4 in all of the events he won.
Besides that I agree with most of what you put though I think you're sleeping on Trap for 2021. Though it doesn't help that his impressive results were near cleanly split between 2020 and 2021.
After checking Traps results again I think it's him in 2021 and it's not even really close. Victories in Last chance, TSL, 2 super tournaments, Next, and a bunch of 2nd places. I checked again and I agree on picking Trap in 2021. I forgot how impressive that one year stretch was, especially considering Protoss' relative weaker performance in big tournaments last few years. 2018 is especially a hard one because if either one of Serral and Maru didn't exist, people would've considered their 2018 to be by far the greatest peak year of anyone ever. But we somehow have both of their crazy stretches overlapped in 2018. Maru's WESG and 3 GSL is probably a little more impressive on paper than Serral's 3 EU WCS, GSL vs World, WCS grand finals and Homestory XVIII, but I will still argue for Serral for the following reason: - Serral was literally invincible in second half of 2018 in offline events, went 43-0 in series record, including 15 straight series win against top Korean players. -The offline match record against Korean players overall in 2018: 22-4 (85%) for Serral, 27-10 (73%) for Maru - the historic significance of having a foreign player that didn't grew up in Korean Esports infrastructure won world champion over Koreans for the first time ever, and in convincing fashion. This was legit one of the biggest news of SC2 history. Looking back, now everyone just kinda remember 2018 to be the year of Serral. I really can't pick any other player that year.
I will argue that preparation style tournaments with at least a few days in between each match and at least a week of prep time for the finals far outweighs any weekender, even WCS Finals/Blizzcon/EPT. Long prep style tournaments simply require much much more skill than weekenders, even if you play and win against the players that participate in the prep style ones. I would say 1 GSL Code S = 1.5 premier weekenders, including the world finals. Prize pool is a thing, but so is the tournament format.
Unfair to say that a player that has won BOTH styles is even equal to one that refuses to participate in one of the formats.
|
Prep tournament doesn't require much more skill. It just shifts the skills. They actually depend less on gameplay skills since preparation is about predicting and practicing the right things and that skill can be supplemented by outside support. Whereas weekenders tend to have more improvisation and adaptation.
GSL was on a pedestal among competitions because of the player pool. Not for having preparation time.
|
2017 Innovation is the only one I didn't see coming but then it becomes hard to call up another candidate. SoO or Rogue could claim it though.
I don't see a debate for 2018, Serral gets that. 2023 is closer.
|
2017, 2020 should be the year of Rogue while 2018 should be Maru. There is no debate about it and Maru should own the 2018.
Serral can contest the 2022-2023 period in which he dominate the most, the time when most active Korean players are absent, notably Rogue.
|
Taeja as player of the year in 2013 feels wrong, but I guess all the other contenders (Inno, Soulkey, sOs, Jaekong, Dear) either didn't win too many tournaments and or were inconsistent.
I'd say Rogue 2020, Trap 2021, Serral 2022, and Serral 2023.
|
On March 31 2024 05:59 JJH777 wrote: I'd go Maru over Serral in 2018 because 3 GSLs and WESG is more impressive than Blizzcon and GSL vs the World and region locked tournaments barely weigh in at all. I also think that's consistent with the logic that put Innovation over Rogue in 2017. From a format and player pool perspective GSL was harder to win than world championships back then. I'd still rate the world championships higher than GSL due to the prize pool but imo it's only like a 2:1.5 ratio at best in favor of Blizzcon and that's not enough for Serral to come out ahead. Considering that WESG is more impressive than GSL vs the World the only way to have Serral come out ahead is if you think a Blizzcon is worth 3 2018 GSLs by itself which is pretty crazy given the history of how rare repeat winners were in GSL before Maru. I also think it's relevant that Maru was the only Terran in the ro8 of 2/4 of those events he won while Serral had other Zergs in the ro8 and usually even the ro4 in all of the events he won.
I think this is the wrong way to look at it though. Very few people think Serral's 2018 is amazing simply because he won GSL vs world/Blizzcon/HSC/four WCS EU + Show Spoiler + Don't forget the HSC win, which was nothing to scoff at - plenty of great players there . That's incredible results obviously, but it isn't what made it legendary. It's rather the holistic fact that he literally didn't lose an offline series from March until the end of the year, and only one online bo3 to Neeb at the end of the year if I remember correctly. There's never been a player that's had that kind of result, before or after.
And I don't think it's far to say "Okay the three international tournaments are impressive but he should be expected to not lose a series to foreigners." No, not at all. Even the absolute greats would regularly lose a bo3 series to a foreigner if they played enough. Take Maru losing to Cyan, and Cyan is one of the absolute weakest foreigners. Serral crushing the whole year from March onwards 48-0 + Show Spoiler + Not sure exact number but something close to that I think is monumentally different than going 47-1.
Dark is the only counterweight to that, in that he went something like 37-0 against foreigners. But that was an absolutely awesome statistic and rightly applauded, and applauded because it was unique. And it wasn't paired with absolutely crushing every international tournament he entered March onwards for the rest of the year.
The second counter-weight to Maru's three won GSL's is that, unfortunately, for the first time in its history most/all of them did not have the strongest player in the world in them, which I think many people would agree was Serral from some point early-mid 2018 onwards.
With that said, Maru's three GSLs/WESG in 2018 is an absolutely legendary achievement and I still think it's quite close or even better than Serral's 2018. It's just definitely a close question, which makes these posts kind of funny in how strongly they feel there's "no debate" for opposite conclusions.
On March 31 2024 16:55 swarminfestor wrote: 2017, 2020 should be the year of Rogue while 2018 should be Maru. There is no debate about it and Maru should own the 2018.
On March 31 2024 16:05 kaos00 wrote:
I don't see a debate for 2018, Serral gets that. 2023 is closer.
|
|
|
|