We’re out of the brutal Bo1s of the Ro24 and now enter the true gauntlet of challengers the Ro16, both groups this week feature former ASL champions, Soulkey and JyJ in Group A, Mini and Royal in Group B.

Check out what we have to say about them.

Soulkey, the title holder of last ASL, arguably still as confident as the week after winning ASL16. JyJ hasn't shown any sign of mental weakness since his television debut. From the Ro24 we saw Mong still chucks his 1 liter procari sweat bottles in hopes of channeling his inner Flash. And Bisu, he still has it after all these years. Recently Bisu is even peaking to the 2nd spot on sponbang, which very well may have to do with the AK he performed on both MPL and KCM. Sponbang is not very user-friendly for non-Korean speakers, so I should really refrain from from even mentioning it. I'm merely trying to create some hype for BisuDagger's beloved.

The ASL maps are around 50-50, being new and being played enough to get some meaningful stats from it. However... first Ro16 games are still Bo1 in which anything can happen and I could say the same for Bo3 with this group. All the players have decent potential to beat one another, with Mong being tier 4 for a reason. He had better get his procari sweat game ready. Maps don't matter yet at this stage, they're part of the fun if anything.

Bisu has been a stable player ever since BW went underground and rose up from its ashes again. He's also shown a nice performance recently. It makes me excited to see him play in this group. Can Bisu use that momentum and the 2-0 from last round to confidently play out this group?

Soulkey has got to be the favorite of this group. I'd say you can safely LB him. And with Mong being the least favorite: tier 4 in ASL, whom also hardly ever plays in MPL unlike the other 3, bet against him. 2 players will advance, it leaves Bisu or JyJ to LB on. I've been pondering on this a few days ago. Hype told me Bisu is the obvious choice here. JyJ though!...

Ever since JyJ rose in the ASL and even sealing a marriage deal upon winning one, he has been confident in playing ASL. JyJ reminds me of the old Light in a way. Light had sick TvZ, great TvT and laughable TvP. By now Light has been the #1 Terran ever since Flash went mia (missing in acion).

Sorry, back to JyJ. JyJ has very nice TvZ and unlike Piano managed to make that style also work for him in TvT. It's just - like Light had to - he needs to figure out how he can make TvP work for him as well. Checking out some MPL results, I see JyJ is getting in more wins against Protoss than he used to. It's a sign he may be following Light's footsteps. For now we should assume his TvP still needs a lot of ironing however.

Speaking of ironing. While Bisu is a very well rounded player, he never really ironed out his PvT and there are 2 Terrans in this group. Mong is a threat to Bisu, so is JyJ who's good at preparing Best ofs. Let me just give you the old "Anything can happen in this group". Mong could for sure beat Soulkey in the first game and then he could have both a Bo3 vs Bisu and JyJ to make it out of the group. That's within reason for Mong.

Despite Bisu still being a PvZ master, he is not a favorite vs Soulkey and it's arguably a coinflip vs the 2 Terrans regardless of Bo1 or Bo3 because "Bisu PvT" and also this is ASL, ASL has not been kind on Bisu. On the other side JyJ has a great chance to beat either Soulkey or Mong in a Bo3. Therefor I ultimately chose JyJ over Bisu for my LB. Now I just hope Bisu or even Mong (a bit of a stretch, I know) will prove me wrong. This group is my most anticipated group.

Actually, this whole Ro16 is like the best we ever had. Get hyped and make sure you tune in and chat or LR with your fellow BW nerds!

Soulkey and JyJ To Advance To The Ro8!

Even after his showing last season I remain doubtful that Mini is truly back. He was crushed and thrown into the wind against soulkey in that finals after all and with the kind of mental game Mini keeps its a pretty big downer for him. That said, mini losing the finals did put him in Group B automatically which means his streak is finally broken, if you’re superstitious you can assume this affects his luck, whether positively or negatively remains to be seen, but looking at the crop of his opponents, its still a mixed bag and a hard challenge.

Mini boasts a solid above 50% winrate in all his matchups with PvT being both his most played and also his tightest matchup, A lot of material for BarrackS to prepare against for sure but Mini should still more than easily take that opening game, the real challenge comes going into the winner’s Bo3 against either Royal or hero, hero is the better matchup for him in general favouring against him both offline and online historically.

Royal’s path is a bit more clear, Royal is in general extremely favoured against hero both in offline and online matches, despite the slight losing record in his matches but he’s also one of the most active players online so if he’s putting out his regular performance he should make it to winner’s game against most likely Mini, though he’d be more than happy to face BarrackS if he comes out on top against Mini. RoyaL vs Mini is harder to predict, their recent ultimate battle series went to 9 games with Royal just barely coming out on top, its absolutely a series worth looking forward to if we get it.

Zerg has had it pretty bad this season and this group doesn’t make it any better for their odds, hero is stuck facing against two opponents he generally hasn’t done his best work against, a quick buffer is that he will most likely beat BarrackS especially since they won’t be meeting in a Bo1 at all. Beating RoyaL or Mini means pulling out all the stops, his opening against RoyaL, who’s already the tougher opponent than mini for him will dictate his run in this group.

BarrackS always surprises with his Ro16 entries, its not even like he has a bad winning record but he’s certainly a tier below his fellow group members, its possible he can shake up Mini with a good timing to go into the winner’s game, once we hit Bo3s he’d have to play like he’s in the finals against the other 3.

Royal and Mini To Advance To The Ro8!

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Writers: BLinD-RawR, Peeano
Graphics: v1
Editors: BLinD-RawR