EPT
+ Show Spoiler [That game] +
Glhf in life Sea.
Sources-Parts 1-3
http://esports.dailygame.co.kr/news/read.php?id=72577
http://esports.dailygame.co.kr/news/read.php?id=73206
http://esports.dailygame.co.kr/news/read.php?id=74421
[Gamergraphy] The product of the youth sport system...Yum Bo Sung(1)
![[image loading]](http://i.min.us/iHGdtTYi8usWN.jpg)
Hello, this is Daily eSports Nam Yoon Sung journalist.
Looking at the highs and lows of each progamer's debut and retirement, 'Gamergraphy' is continuing to be published. Last month I finished up the last chapter of Park Tae Min (
GoRush), and when I tried to write again it was hard to find another character.[*Note to TLPD - The 8 in Gorush id TLPDizes into Team 8]
During my pondering, recently I heard of a certain player's retirement announcement. The Terran that transferred to TeamLiquid, it was the announcement of Yum Bo Sung's (
Sea) retirement. Sea's retirement gave me quite a shock.Living as a journalist, I have strong memories of players I interviewed during my early days as one. When I started being a specialized eSports journalist, I have vivid memories of my conversations with the progamers. Amongst them, Sea was one of those players.
◆POS's pride, their youth sports system.
I first met
Sea in 2005. Sea was born in 1990 so in Korean age his true age was 14. [For those who are curious http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_age#Korean］ He was in his 3rd year in middle school. At that time Sea was part of the practice partners. Led by coach Ha Tae Ki, team POS with Park Sung Joon (
July) and Park Ji Ho (
Pusan) performing well they garnered much attention. Coach Ha showed these key players but he told me he had some hidden cards up his sleeve. One of those players was Sea.Coach Ha Tae Ki's plan was to create a youth programer cultivation system. Among middle school students, he would find talented players and training them as practice players for 2-3 years, at their high school age he planned to debut them. Like famous football teams Real Madrid, Barcelona, or Manchester United etc, you can say he applied their youth system into eSports.
Coach Ha's first product was
Sea. POS looked for middle school students as trainees. Some players found in this system have splendid careers. Sea, Kim Taek Yong (Bisu), and Lee Jae Ho (Light) are players that are active even now, the fruits of the youth sports system by POS.I went to interview
Sea, but he wasn't in the practice room. I grabbed the interview time at 3pm but he had some business left to take care of at school so he was late. Naturally I said, "It must be because he's in high school." Then Coach Ha responds, "Not really, he's a middle schooler so he is freely going to school", which made me quite flustered.After school wearing his backpack to the practice room,
Sea didn't even have any acne on his face. POS players were mostly on the younger side but they greeted all the regular players courteously. When I asked him for an interview and Sea replied, "Why are you interviewing a player who hasn't even played an official match?" With that mature answer I could not look at him as just a child.![[image loading]](http://i.min.us/ibyBtvF21GE5If.jpg)
◆L'enfant Terrible
As soon as
Sea debuted, he made his mark in the scene. POS without a deep roster mostly relying on July and Pusan, as soon as they acquired Sea in the progamer draft they entered him into official matches. Getting the chance to play in Proleague, and the event that solidified Sea as the Terran Ace for POS was beating the legends on KTF MagicNs.In 2005 MSL's sub-league, the survivor league when
Sea defeated Hong Jin Ho (YellOw) he started gathering attention. It was September 15th 2005. Even though Yellow was going through a minor slump nobody thought that he would get taken out by a rookie like Sea. A month later in a rematch in the survivor league, Sea would meet Yellow again and defeat him again.Sea's true abilities started to show in January of 2006 within the K-SWISS OnGameNet Dual Tournament. After demolishing Park Jung Seok (Reach), a Starleague winner and taking out Hanbit Star's ace Kim Joon Young (GGPlay) he advanced 1st in his group. In the group placement matches he was put in the group with YellOw and Jo Young Ho (ChoJJa). After going through two intense sets of tiebreakers, in the end Sea defeated the two strongest zergs at the time and took 1st place in group B. For the 1st place in the Dual Tournament, the final match was against KTF MagicN’s Kang Min (Nal_rA).After winning the Hangame Starleague,
Nal_rA aimed to recover by taking 1st in the Dual Tournament to enter the Starleague. Meeting a rookie Sea, everyone predicted an easy victory for Nal_ra. However the result was the opposite. Sea with his solid mechanics and late game management prowess took down Nal_ra with a 3:2 score and received a seed into the OSL main tournament. (For the qualifiers up to 3rd place was league entrance and for the 1st place in the tournament was given the 4th seed).TLPD of Tournament - http://www.teamliquid.net/tlpd/korean/leagues/102_K-SWISS_ODT_R1
Through
Sea's rise in Starleague, the team most affected was KTF MagicN's. Star players Yellow, Chojja, Nal_ra, Reach etc were all defeated one by one. Sea was referred to as KTF Killer and afterwards earned the nickname of 'L'enfant Terrible', meaning a fearsome child in French.![[image loading]](http://i.min.us/ij00LHdYcSbGN.jpg)
◆The beginning of his individual league curse.
One of the definitive phrases to describe
Sea is 'The Warrior of Proleague'. He performed excellently against the best of them to even put his team on the golden pedestal in Proleague but Sea's skill dropped off severely during individual leagues.The start of
Sea's underperformance in individual leagues is in the Shinhan Bank Starleague S1 in 2006 after taking KT MagicN's legends. This tournament wasn't a Round of 16 tournament, to have more participants in the tournament it was their first attempt at having a Round of 24. Within the Ro24 Sea demolished Lee Byung Min (Goodfriend), Kim Sung Jae (RainBOw), Kim Nam Gi (Child) and entered the Round of 16.After the tournament system was changed, the tournament started from the Round of 16.
Sea's opponent was Park Myung Soo (YellOw[ArnC] often referred to as fake Yellow or I would just say ArnC). With clean and precise Mutalisk control Yellow[ArnC] defeated Sea 2:1.Afterwards within
Sea's progaming career the individual league jinx followed him. He entered the main tournaments well but only having entered the Round of 8 once, develops the worst career possible. While defeating opponents handily in Proleague, but having the jinx of getting defeated by the same players in the individual leagues was probably the byproduct of his early period of dominance at the start of his career.[Gamergraphy] The Warrior of Proleague...Yum Bo Sung(2)
![[image loading]](http://i.min.us/irtm3e27vPB9g.jpg)
◇The leader during MBCGame Heroes' golden age, Yum Bo Sung.
Hello this is Daily eSports journalist Nam Yoon Sung.
2 weeks ago I wrote about
Sea's beginnings. He entered Starcraft at a young age, caught the eyes of POS's Coach Ha Tae Ki/Seo Hyung Seok, Sea was an ideal player in the eyes of the team's organizers.In 2004 and 2005 Proleague and the teams inside it lead the development of eSports culture in Korea. KT and SK Telecom, Samsung Electronics, Hanbitsoft, Pantech etc domestic digital companies became interested in eSports, created progaming teams at Pusan Gwanganli Beach since 2004 held the finals there and attracted tens of thousands fans to the event.
Even with the short history of eSports, IT Companies growth, development and the interest of youth, and with the focused investment the scene grew rapidly. The result from those three crucial conditions was several companies creating their own progaming teams. Even
Sea who was inside POS, received a love call from the cable game channel called MBCGame. It happened in March 2006.![[image loading]](http://i.min.us/ihUHS3lZJCpKh.jpg)
◇The driving force that led MBCGame, creation and first championship.
◆The Warrior of Proleague
Sea was the main pillar of the new team MBCGame Hero. During the team creation ceremony 'God of War' Park Sung Jun (July) and 'Spirit Toss' Park Ji Ho (Pusan) were the main driving force, but Sea contributed the most to the team.In 2006 MBCGame Hero achieved 4th place during the regular season, cruising through the postseason and raised the team to the gold,
Sea was 'the' player that delivered a definite win. 2006 SKY Proleague semifinal playoffs match in their flawless 4:0 victory Sea defeated the Terran Kim Yoon Hwan (Hery) and in the playoffs match versus CJ he teamed up with Jung Young Chul (Thezerg) and defeated Kim Min Goo (MinGu) and Kim Hwan Joong (Rage).The 1st semester finals in Pusan Gwanganli Beach, MBCGame lost to SK Telecom T1 1:4 but
Sea was the one victory over Lim Yo Hwan (Boxer) and saved the team from a 0 win performance. [linked above ^_^]In the second round
Sea showed his true skills once again. Within 2v2's having 2 losses and 1v1 record of 3 wins 2 losses, within the post season he grabbed a win in both playoffs and semi-playoffs to carry his team to victory.2006, with the closing of the season the winners of first half and second half duked it out in the finals to decide the champion. Round 1 winners SK Telecom and round 2 winners MBCGame Hero clashed in the final match.
Sea may have lost to Go In Kyu (Canata) but defeated Park Tae Min (GoRush) in the finals and carried his team to glory. Reaching the summit that is the champion of Proleague within the first year of sponsorship backing, 'The Warrior of Proleague' Sea's role was the most important.Since then MBCGame entered the postseason often and showed impressive performance.
Sea may have never won a 'most wins award' in a season, until late 08-09 season he produced a 60% win rate in Proleague and made his mark as one of the best players around. Until announcing his retirement in December of 2012, with 172 wins he is still 5th inside the most wins ranking.![[image loading]](http://i.min.us/ibwk5GKvaJsJKE.jpg)
◇MBCGame Hero winning the 2006 championship finals, Sea receives the MVP.
◆Dominating the post season
Sea's true power not only appeared in the regular season but also the post season. Mentioned earlier of his regular season wins, he debuted in 2005 ending with 172 wins and ranked 5th with the most wins. His postseason record is even more impressive. July 15th 2006, getting winning first postseason victory against the current KT Rolster coach Kim Yoon Hwan (
Hery) in the semi-playoffs on the map 'Peaks of Baekdu', until his retirement he recorded 14 wins. Amongst them one 2v2 win, the rest were 1v1 matches.One of
Sea's famous matches in the postseason was in the 2006 championship ace match against GoRush. Sea was sent in the 1st set but was taken out by Canata. Through the support of his teammates MBCGame reached the ace match, MBCGame sent Sea and won in an exciting match over Gorush. Honestly this was a mistake by SK Telecom to send Gorush. It was because Sea's record at the time on 'Peaks of Baekdu' was 10 wins and 1 loss. Sea also showed dominance over Zerg on the map so it was a crucial mistake to send Gorush. Nonetheless there is no mistake this was Sea's greatest postseason game. Through this game Sea also earned the title of Finals MVP.![[image loading]](http://i.min.us/ib0v66w0ARRUaR.jpg)
◇After his victory, sharing his happiness with the fans. He knows how to treat his fans well.
After that
Sea quickly became the image of MBCGame. The presence of July and Pusan were decreasing, while producing quality players like Lee Jae Ho (Light), Kim Taek Yong (Bisu), Go Seok Hyun (HyuN), Min Chan Ki (RuBy) etc they held a high placement in the regular season and entered the postseason often.![[image loading]](http://i.min.us/ibi4xFbOBCszin.jpg)
[1-
Bisu, 2-FanTaSy, 3-Flash, 4-HoeJJa, 4-Sea, 4-Jaedong, 7-Stork, 7-Light, 9-sKyHighTies are settled by the last column, Win Rate]
◇Proleague Post Season Most Wins Ranking. Sea retired with 14 wins, tied for 4th within the rank.
With the 08-09 Season post season changing to have 6 teams, it created more matches for
Sea to gather experience. Until 09-10 Season Playoffs Sea had the record of 14 wins 3 losses showing an impressive win rate and holding 1st place in it. Until the arrival of Bisu, Lee Young Ho (Flash), Jung Myung Hoon (FanTaSy), Jo Byung Sae (sKyHigh) etc Post Season powerhouses, Sea held 1st in most postseason wins and win rate for almost 3 years.Until he decided on retirement, he ended his career a 4 game losing streak in the postseason which weakened his postseason image, but he still holds the record tied for 4th in most wins.
![[image loading]](http://i.min.us/i5qZ93BjA7pcr.jpg)
◆Sea, the Teacher.
Sea's ability to raise his juniors was outstanding. Entering the team at a young age and meeting many coaching staff, he absorbed the strong points of his teachers. Coach Ha Tae Ki's charisma, Kim Hyuk Seop coach's softness, Seo Hyung Seok/Park Yong Woon coaches' s scientific analysis, and Lee Woon Jae coach's human touch, he absorbed all of it.He was never appointed as coaching staff but with his qualities in leadership and analysis he taught his juniors to become stronger players.
OnGameNet had a program called 'Star Brain' before. It was a program that had rookie progamers battling against each other under the guidance of veteran progamers. From this program
Sea guided his junior RuBy, with excellent judgment of the situation and outstanding speaking ability he earned the title of 'Yum-Teacher'.While 'Star Brain' was an event match, even within the team Sea not only taught his Terran juniors but taught other MBCGame players a variety of strategies and fulfilled the role of a mentor.
[Gamergraphy] Sea's destiny tied with MBCGame?...Yum Bo Sung(3)
![[image loading]](http://i.min.us/iVKWKMEE7pTWJ.jpg)
◇Group picture in the early days when MBCGame Hero was formed.
It is the same for every sports player, they despise leaving the team that raised them. Every player picked up in the rookie draft would want to wear their team uniform forever, after becoming the star of the franchise the ultimate goal would be to become the team's coach. However that only happens to 1% of the players. There are players that transfer here and there that they are called 'Journeyman', when their Free Agency comes up there are times where other teams pick them up and they leave their original team. In that sense
Sea was a special case. As a star of the franchise he walked the tepid path with MBCGame Hero, the team unfortunately had to disband and the fire inside his progaming soul started to wither.![[image loading]](http://i.min.us/ibfoU7qUx1StKA.jpg)
◇In 2006, MBCGame Hero's winning formula
Sea (Yum Bo 'Sung'), Pusan (Park 'Ji' Ho), July('Park' Sung Joon). They took a part of each of their names and the trio was referred to as 'Park Ji Sung'.◆Franchise Star
For MBCGame Hero, they were adept at producing talented players. From Coach Ha Tae Ki's youth cultivation system, to Coach Seo Hyung Seok/Park Yong Woon, Kim Hyuk Seob, Lee Woon Jae coach's eyes for players were very sharp. The result is players found and raised like
Sea, Light, Bisu, and RuBy etc.However MBCGame had a fundamental problem. The reason to create their pro team is to promote themselves but in this society it was dangerous to raise your voice. Cable Game/eSports with those two common traits, to have proper competition with OnGameNet MBCGame created Heroes. Of course it wasn't just to maintain their position within the industry, but MBCGame's strategy became a minus for the Heroes team.
There are many events that reflect this. In 2006 season, MBCGame defeats SK Telecom and wins the championship final, but their veteran
July's contract needed renewal. With disagreements in his contract renewal his waiver is released. And afterwards he get's picked up by SK Telecom.2 years later in 2008, MBCGame sends another franchise star in
Bisu to SK Telecom again. It was a cash transaction this time. At that time with Boxer entering the army for SK Telecom their main players' performance falling off they needed a generation change, and MBCGame wanted to be a model to show they can be profitable managing a progaming team and traded off Bisu.When deciding to send off Bisu, MBCGame had a clear plan in mind. 'We have
Sea and Light, and we're raising players now to continue'. Even with Bisu's transfer MBCGame remained a Proleague powerhouse. Sea and Light did not benefit greatly but maintained a constant level of skill and raised more juniors.During that process
Sea received the right to Free Agency in 2009. Debuting in 2005 he was in his 5th year as a progamer, having plenty of experience under his belt he could freely negotiated with any team. Without much problems Sea renewed his contract with MBCGame. Sea renewed with a salary with 75,000,000 wons with optional provisions 100,000,000 wons [Roughly around $60,000~$80,000 USD in '09] Previously transferring star players with high salaries, Sea became first player on MBCGame Hero to have a 100,000,000 won salary, Sea was the franchise’s star.![[image loading]](http://i.min.us/ixIgPpklQqMLf.jpg)
◇This picture is from when MBCGame Hero won their championship final in 2006. Over time MBCGame would transfer players on their main roster and gradually become a weaker team.
◆The downfall of MBCGame
In 2009 from Free Agency
Sea and Light who grew stronger together both decided to renew their contracts. As a senior there was Pusan but Sea was the true leader of MBCGame. Sea continued to perform as one the main players and fulfilled his role as the leader on the bench as well.Sadly MBCGame Hero slowly started falling apart. In 2008
Bisu and Coach Park Yong Woon moved to SK Telecom, and with Coach Ha Tae Ki being replaced only Coach Kim Hyuk Seob remained from the POS days. Becoming the main coach from a sub coach, Kim Hyuk Seob could not last 2 years on the team and left MBCGame Hero leaving an unsettling atmosphere.Additionally another shocking rumor appeared. It was the rumor that MBCGame was being planned to change it's broadcasting contents. Not related to games or eSports, with the rumors of changing into a music channel spreading the players fell into a state of despair. Then the rumor became reality.
Sea's longtime teammate Light was sold to Woongjin Stars. At that time Light's salary wasn't a small cost either, so MBCGame used that to keep the progaming team afloat.![[image loading]](http://i.min.us/i2k17ddF8sTSr.jpg)
◇Wearing the 8th Team uniform, Sea.
Walking on the path of their downfall, MBCGame Hero after the end of the 10-11 season they broke up their progaming team. Also the cable game channel known as MBCGame closed it's doors and was changed into a music channel.
Amongst the players that was represented MBCGame Hero
Sea, Kim Jae Hoon (Jaehoon now goes by Argo), Ha Jae Sang (Sang aka Terminator) were saved. Other progaming teams that shut their doors around the same time Hwaseung, Wemade players were picked to become the 8th Team members.Former Hwaseung Lee Jae Dong (
Jaedong), former Wemade Jeon Tae Yang (BaBy aka Ty) etc also with former MBCGame's Sea, if they put their efforts together there were predictions that they would become the strongest team, however Sea's will was slowly crumbling.![[image loading]](http://i.min.us/ibRBQfiuxfcrx.jpg)
◇Screenshot of Sea's retirement on TL.
◆The transfer to Liquid and retirement
In SK Planet Proleague season 2, he had a subpar record in Starcraft 2 which was 3 wins and 4 losses. For
Sea who stayed with the Team 8 for a year, requested a transfer into the foreign team, Team Liquid. Soon approaching his mandatory military service date, he must have wanted a chance to play outside of Korea. For both Team 8 and Sea's future, an agreement is made.But the problem was the in the leagues
Sea wanted to participate in, was Starcraft 2. In the situation where Sea has not fully mastered the game he entered Liquid and participated in several foreign tournaments but he showed lackluster results.Feeling like he hit a wall in SC2, nearly 3 months later he announced his retirement. Afterwards he started SC1 broadcasting himself on the internet and also suffered defeat in the Ro32 of Itembay Sonic Starleague.
Personally I think it's a shame for
Sea's ending. If MBCGame did not change into a music channel and if the team wasn't disbanded, whether it stayed SC1 or became SC2 he would've kept his place as one of the highest skilled players to play the game. MBCGame Hero, specifically carrying the spirit of POS inside his bones, with the transfers of his teammates and the disbanding of MBCGame Hero, Sea probably lost his interest in the game itself.He loved football so much that one of his nicknames were 'Yum-Messi' and whenever he was in a slump he mentioned he looked at the players' fantastic goal videos and got motivation from them. His final dream was going to Spain. Sea also mentioned as a Barcelona fan he wanted to see a live football match in Nou Camp (their home stadium), watching Tikitaka play in the flesh. To his unfulfilled dream until his transfer to Liquid, I hope it will come true within the rest of his life.
[Daily eSports Nam Yoon Sung Journalist thenam@dailyesports.com]
*Together in the eSports world with SK Telecom (www.sktelecom.com)
