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Hmm, a few things that I noticed over the past few weeks that are relevant. Since for the most part OSL is ready to proceed, I think it's a good time to note these.
1. Flash probably lost focus after he felt like he became invincible. Remember when he said "I have achieved enlightenment" and proceeded to lose to Effort then go on the ace match streak? Well, this is kinda the same, except Ssak, Classic, Hyuk and even Kal are not as good as Effort was, yet Flash didn't beat any of them. He only beat Paralyze, a rookie that hasn't been playing too good of games recently. Nevertheless, I expect him to bounce back and do better within a span of 2-3 months. Losing both leagues is bad, but his problem is not impossible to correct. After all, he really hasn't been doing bad in PL at all. He just has an attitude that doesn't suit him.
2. Jaedong... ugh, I don't know what happened to him. He's known better than anyone else for an unbreakable consistency, but those finals against Flash really seem like they broke him. He lost his decision-making somewhere along the way. I've been saying that something seems wrong with JD for a while, but I've been willing to accept that a few losses could've been flukes, but not anymore. He lost to Hiya and Hogil, along with every good player he's played this time around(Zero, Stork, Lightx2, Hydra maybe?). Something went wrong after that MSL, and we saw it in the cheese of the OSL(also in the games against Stork, though that could've just been a bad day), the awful play in game 3 of the WCG Grand finals, and in his games ever since. In the MSL, he was losing games to Light and Sea when the metagame favored terran. Yet at the time he still had his angryface on and proceeded to defeat both players regardless. In the games against Stork, he did no such thing, and against Flash and in all his later games he no longer looked like JD the killer. I'm no longer willing to dismiss this as a fluke and I'm going to say that something is wrong with JD. He's playing too aggressively and losing games that he shouldn't. I say the problem here is much worse than Flash's. But if Jaedong still has any of his ability to recover left in him, he may be back to full form faster than I expect him to. Also, he's very close to dropping out of the 2300 club.
3. Stork NEEDS better PvZ judgment. He's S-class in all 3 matchups like every TBLS, but ugh, his PvZ hasn't been good recently. Other than that horrible abomination of a game that was Stork vs Violet, Stork hasn't really played poorly, except in PvZ. Against an awful-playing Jaedong, he lost again and again to having too few cannons. Against Shine, he didn't have anything, so Shine just made enough stuff to kill him. Against Roro, he had dohsairs and just lost a shuttle with 2 reavers in the stupidest of ways.
4. Bisu needs to stop 3 gating. After it failed EVERY SINGLE TIME he did it, I thought he would get that it's not a good strategy. Also, by now losing to Shine is comparable to Jaedong losing to Fantasy. Not that bad compared to how Jaedong and Flash went out. He just wasn't seeded into the Ro16. But he really needs to show something impressive soon, because I know he's capable of it and he needs to back his PL record with SL results. I think that he's capable of being the best player right now if he just works out his little flaws. Especially since Stork is not only a weaker player but also one with equally questionable decision-making some of the time and at least for the time being, JD and Flash are a bit off their game. He just needs to stop losing to Kal and Shine.
5. OSL zergs. Shine figured something out that no other zerg did, but Modesty and Hydra aren't all that good IMO. They've got a decent record, yet when they lose, there's some very evident flaws in their play. Shine is really good at finding and exploiting weaknesses though, and it really seems like the only way to get around that is to not really give him much of an opening. I think that that game in PL against Bisu really demonstrates the full extent of Shine's abilities, and while Bisu is the best PvZ of all time and it wasn't a 1-sided game, it shows that if you play correctly, Shine is very much beatable. Hyuk, I'm not sure about considering his PL results, but he 3-0d out of the hardest group in the OSL and advances into the Ro8. I hope to see great things from him. Clam is quite the cheesy mollusk, yet he seems to be recovering. Hogil is actually not that bad in PL, I expect that he'll do better after taking a game off JD.
6. Fantasy, stop slumping. You really made it hard for SKT with your poor judgment. You are almost as good as Flash, perhaps even just as good, but sometimes you make the stupidest of decisions. Ugh.
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On December 25 2010 05:56 Lightwip wrote:
Against an awful-playing Jaedong, he lost again and again to having too few cannons.
Stork knew he had to cut corners to have a chance against Jaedong in a boX and Jaedong capitalized on it. Jaedong was not that awefull when he got in to two finals the same season, right?
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1. This is similar to other giants. Anyone else remember when Oov placed Clon in his OSL group so he could get an easy win only to get demolished? And Savior put all of OGN Sparkyz in his group in order to do a team all-kill and while he gave Terato one of the biggest rapes in SC history, he lost to Yarnc and only made it out 2-1 instead of the 2-0 you'd expect after telling off an entire team.
2. JD isn't looking invincible right now, but he's hardly looking as weak as you are indicating. He's defeated some tough competition as well. If you look at his results page, in ZvP the only players to have beaten him on the entire first page are Stork (4 times), Kal (once) and Bisu (once). He's 10-3 in ZvZ since the start of the new season. And in ZvT, the only player other than Flash or Light to take a game from him in his last 30 is Hiya, his teammate. Cut some slack here. Other than a single critical loss in last night's game he's still looking like a choice candidate for #1 on the PR.
3. PvZ has historically been Stork's weakness. Back in the day he was a chew toy for S-class Zergs. Just look at how he faired against Savior and against Chojja. Yet ironically, if I had to pick any Protoss player to face Jaedong it would be Stork. Not Bisu, not Kal, just Stork. If I'm going to pick on Stork for a weakness, I'm a little unconvinced by his PvP these days. He's scored some wins there recently, but if you look at his past 20, I have him at 8-12. His PvZ is actually a little better, but it's also a bit inconsistent. Stork has been riding his recently-returned-to-god-mode PvT to get him results.
5. (no comment on 4) Shine is good, but yeah, as much as I like him, I hesitate to call him S-class. But he's good. Calm is advancing, again, but over the past few months he kept trading seats with his evil twin Clam so... and Modesty, I'm hesitant on his ZvT and ZvP, but he has a solid reputation as a ZvZ sniper, so we'll see how he does. Hydra is not advancing, but if he were, well he's the #4 Zerg by ELO, so...
6. Fantasy is not as good as Flash. I like Fantasy better than Flash, but he's not as good. In my opinion, Fantasy is a little too dependent on Coach Oov and hasn't done enough to raise his own style. Fooling around with timing builds helped him create the Valkyrie strategy that carried him to nearly winning an OSL, but his bionic TvZ was extremely lacking until recently. It wasn't until around May of this year that he started showing a convincing TvZ, and it's no coincidence that this corresponded with his return to form. Fantasy needs to find his own game of Starcraft. And then maybe he will finally find gold.
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good luck writing the january PR flamewheel
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On December 25 2010 09:30 Mortality wrote:2. JD isn't looking invincible right now, but he's hardly looking as weak as you are indicating. He's defeated some tough competition as well. If you look at his results page, in ZvP the only players to have beaten him on the entire first page are Stork (4 times), Kal (once) and Bisu (once). He's 10-3 in ZvZ since the start of the new season. And in ZvT, the only player other than Flash or Light to take a game from him in his last 30 is Hiya, his teammate. Cut some slack here. Other than a single critical loss in last night's game he's still looking like a choice candidate for #1 on the PR.
That's just it though, all of the people he lost to are good players. His winrate against players I'd give a good chance against him is awful since the last while. Losing to Hogil does indicate that something is wrong, along with the way he played against Light and how he pretty much gave GoRush a free win(although he said no) with a random 5 ling loss.
On December 25 2010 09:30 Mortality wrote:6. Fantasy is not as good as Flash. I like Fantasy better than Flash, but he's not as good. In my opinion, Fantasy is a little too dependent on Coach Oov and hasn't done enough to raise his own style. Fooling around with timing builds helped him create the Valkyrie strategy that carried him to nearly winning an OSL, but his bionic TvZ was extremely lacking until recently. It wasn't until around May of this year that he started showing a convincing TvZ, and it's no coincidence that this corresponded with his return to form. Fantasy needs to find his own game of Starcraft. And then maybe he will finally find gold.
Actually, I'll agree with this one. Nevertheless, Fantasy is a really good ace, he usually beats whoever he's sent out against. Not so much in regular games/SL though.
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On December 25 2010 05:56 Lightwip wrote:
3. Stork NEEDS better PvZ judgment. He's S-class in all 3 matchups like every TBLS, but ugh, his PvZ hasn't been good recently. Other than that horrible abomination of a game that was Stork vs Violet, Stork hasn't really played poorly, except in PvZ. Against an awful-playing Jaedong, he lost again and again to having too few cannons. Against Shine, he didn't have anything, so Shine just made enough stuff to kill him. Against Roro, he had dohsairs and just lost a shuttle with 2 reavers in the stupidest of ways.
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Stork had the busiest schedule that day, he had THREE days FULL of live televised game to play. He played 5 games in the span of 3 days and won 3/5 which I would consider REALLY consistent. He had like 3 hours to practice vs Shine while Shine probably practiced his ass off against Stork making that sick timing push. If Stork practices and prepare REALLY hard for that tiebreaker, chances that he'll make it out alive.
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On December 25 2010 11:30 Xiphos wrote:Show nested quote +On December 25 2010 05:56 Lightwip wrote:
3. Stork NEEDS better PvZ judgment. He's S-class in all 3 matchups like every TBLS, but ugh, his PvZ hasn't been good recently. Other than that horrible abomination of a game that was Stork vs Violet, Stork hasn't really played poorly, except in PvZ. Against an awful-playing Jaedong, he lost again and again to having too few cannons. Against Shine, he didn't have anything, so Shine just made enough stuff to kill him. Against Roro, he had dohsairs and just lost a shuttle with 2 reavers in the stupidest of ways.
. Stork had the busiest schedule that day, he had THREE days FULL of live televised game to play. He played 5 games in the span of 3 days and won 3/5 which I would consider REALLY consistent. He had like 3 hours to practice vs Shine while Shine probably practiced his ass off against Stork making that sick timing push. If Stork practices and prepare REALLY hard for that tiebreaker, chances that he'll make it out alive.
He did say that he basically just used carriers on Light because he was too busy to practice, didn't he?
After watching that game against Shine, I can say that Stork played kinda sloppy at times yet not awful. Maybe a few more cannons would've been a good idea since that build was pretty close to 5 hatch hydra->lurk. Bit heavy on sairs for 5 hatch hydra too. But the dohsairs vs Roro and the cannons against Jaedong isn't very good play from Stork.
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On December 25 2010 11:04 Lightwip wrote:Show nested quote +On December 25 2010 09:30 Mortality wrote:2. JD isn't looking invincible right now, but he's hardly looking as weak as you are indicating. He's defeated some tough competition as well. If you look at his results page, in ZvP the only players to have beaten him on the entire first page are Stork (4 times), Kal (once) and Bisu (once). He's 10-3 in ZvZ since the start of the new season. And in ZvT, the only player other than Flash or Light to take a game from him in his last 30 is Hiya, his teammate. Cut some slack here. Other than a single critical loss in last night's game he's still looking like a choice candidate for #1 on the PR. That's just it though, all of the people he lost to are good players. His winrate against players I'd give a good chance against him is awful since the last while. Losing to Hogil does indicate that something is wrong, along with the way he played against Light and how he pretty much gave GoRush a free win(although he said no) with a random 5 ling loss.
Going back over the data I mentioned... I'll do ZvP first just to establish that there is nothing wrong with it. Jaedong has never lost a series vs Kal and is 7-1 vs Kal in 2010, so clearly Kal doesn't count towards this. He's 7-7 vs Bisu with only one game played in 2010 (Bisu's win that had everyone talking). In both career series encounters he won against Bisu. His "weakness" is Stork whom he is 10-11 against, but he has only lost one series encounter out of 5 and it was a bo3 in WCG. He's 3-4 against Stork in 2010. Jaedong is 7-1 in ZvP this season, his only loss being to Stork. I don't think there is any problem there and I'm convinced he is the favorite against any Protoss.
Now ZvT... he's 5-6 against Light this year, but again, he won both series encounters. Granted, I felt like Light pushed him to the limit and was arguably the stronger player in their MSL encounter, but still. Granted also, Light has beaten him twice since their MSL fight. But Light has the 5th highest TvZ ELO in history. He's been a TvZ animal this year, arguably stronger than Flash (or maybe a little less strong but a little more consistent). And then there's our bonjwa Flash who is 12-8 over Jaedong in 2010. In a bo5 right now I'd say JD vs Light could go either way, which is exactly what I felt 4 months ago. And Flash... he is out of both leagues so I'm not sure what to say there. Really, I think you're over thinking his ZvT results since he's only played 5 games since Flash, two vs Light and one vs a teammate. Battles between teammates are notorious for fluky results and always have been.
Finally ZvZ, as I said, he is 10-3 this season. Okay, his 3 losses were fairly recent, but let's take a look more deeply at his opponents. Losses to Zero (#9 ZvZ ELO), Hydra (#10), and Hogil (waaaaay down the list). Wins over Hydra, Modesty (#3), Roro (#8), Soulkey (#3), and Calm (#5). ZvZ isn't really a coinflip these days as so many people say, but it's still the most unpredictable match-up, so I think Jaedong is doing quite well and isn't losing to players because they are better. He shouldn't have lost to Hogil and he played like trash and I don't know why, but in the end it's just one game, not a trend.
The bottom line, there are only two players in the world I'd potentially pick over Jaedong in a bo5 with any sort of confidence and they are both players I would have picked 4 months ago.
I will grant you that JD does not look invincible right now, but I already said that. I'd still pick him as a favorite over Bisu or Stork but I'd be a liiiiiiittle more worried than I might have before, and if Fantasy is on a good day he definitely could pull a win and I'm still not quite sure about Shine (who, by the way, is a ZvZ monster with 2199 ZvZ ELO making him #2 while #3 is Soulkey at 2115), but 4 months ago I was saying that Flash, Light and Effort could all pull bo5 wins over JD, so...
I don't think there has been a major change in where Jaedong stands. Right this instant there is nobody else I'd choose as #1 over him (dropping Flash due to his failures). Potentially Shine, Fantasy or Stork could do it by the end of the month if I am impressed enough. I suppose maybe Bisu has a chance too, but he seems to be dropping bo3's a lot lately (Shine in OSL this season, Kal in MBC Survivor this season, Kal in WCG...).
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To be honest, a lot of those results are outdated. I really am basing what I'm saying on the results post-Bigfile finals, since it wouldn't make sense to say JD was weak before those as he just ELO peaked at the time. Starting with the series against Stork, he has a 65.7% winrate, 73.1% if you start after OSL finals. That definitely doesn't look too bad, but most of his wins are against easy opponents.
His ZvP, I say it's as good as it needs to be(10-3, 77% since MSL). I'm willing to just say that JD had a REALLY bad day against Stork. He even said the same thing. He lost to Stork again, but he convincingly destroyed his other opponents. No real problem right now, the only protoss that could give him trouble are TaekBang.
ZvZ, honestly I don't know(10-3 again). A similar record to his ZvP, but some more questionable play and a few really questionable losses+ Gorush game. But the thing is, all the ZvZ's he's lost actually mattered. vs Zero and Hydra were aces, and vs Hogil was facing elimination. worth taking note of. Still beats weaker zergs pretty easily though, except when he threw away an advantage vs Hogil.
ZvT is kinda off though, (3-6, 33%). Granted, OSL finals against Flash and 2 games against Light, but I think the best ZvT could've won more than 1 of 6 games against these two. It didn't really look like he stood much of a chance against them at all. Skyhigh and Piano are, quite obviously, easy pickings, so those 2 wins don't make up for all the losses. It's fair to say that Jaedong is a drum vT right now.
His ELO has certainly taken a toll from all his losses, if that needs to be mentioned. His play is more often questionable nowadays as well(only thing I remember from last season was all-in muta vs Sea).
If I had to choose now, JD is still #1. But a lot of top players could easily take it from him.
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So does Kal lose consideration for #1 for losing to fbh? Not that firebathero isn't obviously the best Terran ever despite his record (/fanboy), but there is this TvP thing...
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I don't think he really should've been considered much in the first place, because I'm quite sure there's numerous players better than him. He just isn't consistent enough.
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1.Stork
2.Jaedong
3.Shine
4.Flash
5.Fantasy
6.Snow
7.Hydra
8.Roro
9.Leta
10.Kal
CNBC
Light
Zero
Bisu
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United States13143 Posts
On December 25 2010 16:08 EGWF1212 wrote:
1.Stork
2.Jaedong
3.Shine
4.Flash
5.Fantasy
6.Roro
7.Hydra
8.Snow
9.Leta
10.Kal
CNBC
Light
Zero
There's a lot of things wrong with this, but I for some reason the one that bothers me the most is Stork over Shine. I don't see how you could argue that right now.
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I'm dropping the Jaedong discussion for now because I feel like we need to see more results against Terrans not named Flash or Light before these results are meaningful. With ZvZ I'm not concerned so much by when he loses it as whether he is consistent (which he still is) because of the volatile nature of the MU. We both agree that right now he's #1 (in light of Flash's failure -- lol) and that other players need to step up to prove they are more worthy of the crown.
On December 25 2010 15:43 Lightwip wrote:
I don't think he really should've been considered much in the first place, because I'm quite sure there's numerous players better than him. He just isn't consistent enough.
I wouldn't say "numerous" but I agree with the sentiment here. #7 by ELO. His 17-10 17-11 record this season looks pretty solid, but then you realize that his win rate has been declining. 5-5 in his past 10 (2 wins in past 6 games), 6-6 6-7 in the month of December. Admittedly he has pulled some critical wins when it counted (ace matches, OSL), and admittedly he's played a lot of tough or underrated opponents, but even if I try to look past a loss to a Bisu or a Zero or a Horang2 (#1 PvP ELO), I still see a player whose best result is Silver. Kal needs to simultaneously rape his MSL group and hope for bad results for everybody else if he wants #1.
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Hey, by the way, Xellos for CBNC? 2-0 so far this season... smashing Fantasy and Shuttle.
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On December 25 2010 16:15 Elyvilon wrote:Show nested quote +On December 25 2010 16:08 EGWF1212 wrote:
1.Stork
2.Jaedong
3.Shine
4.Flash
5.Fantasy
6.Roro
7.Hydra
8.Snow
9.Leta
10.Kal
CNBC
Light
Zero There's a lot of things wrong with this, but I for some reason the one that bothers me the most is Stork over Shine. I don't see how you could argue that right now.
I changed the rankings and put Snow in the top 10 and Bisu on CNBC.
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Perhaps as a shoutout for oldschool value, but that's not really enough results for legitimately getting on CBNC.
Sashin deserves a shoutout too honestly. There should be a section for shoutouts in PR.
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FREEAGLELAND26781 Posts
I'll include one this month.
lol Leta -__-
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Next PR will definitively be tricky with all the best players failing on some level. Very few outstanding performances overall this month. Shine probably looked the best but even though he has been much improved I wouldn't place him at #1 before he proves his worth by actually winning a title.
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On December 25 2010 15:43 Lightwip wrote:
I don't think he really should've been considered much in the first place, because I'm quite sure there's numerous players better than him. He just isn't consistent enough.
Dude, if there's one thing Kal is, it's consistent. He's been like oldschool Bisu this year: league threat, slightly above-average Proleaguer. Especially, right now, compared to... well, just about everybody except Stork and Shine, he's consistent. You definitely have to consider him in the first place discussion, whether or not you give it to him (and I'm leaning more and more to a Shine #1).
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EPT
