Since the Unholy Alliance was announced, I've been religiously following EG-TL's run through KeSPA's Proleague. Two of my favorite teams, joining forces to try and conquest the super-prestigious team league in Korea; no way I was going to miss it.
Now that the regular season has come to a close, I have taken some time to analyze the team's performance throughout the rounds. I hope this will prove interesting, and that it will help understand the team's progression through the league. Now, let's jump to the graphs.
The Big Picture
Cumulative matches won by EG-TL, compared against all other teams
EG-TL started the first two months of Proleague with an OK showing. Many of us expected the team to crush all opposition, since the team had many SC2 seasoned veterans which would be facing BroodWar pros, who had only been practicing SC2 for a few months. However, EG-TL encountered very well prepared opponents, opponents who made up the lack of SC2 experience with hard work and prepared tactics. From the beginning of the league until the 3rd week of January, EG-TL won 6 out of the 13 matches played, earning them a respectable 4th place, tied with SKT1 and Team8.
However, after that week, their slump begun.
During these weeks, EG-TL players would see this screen way more often than not.
In the following weeks, EG-TL would win only a single match of the 8 that were played. They went from the 4th position to the dead last, and started to become the laughing stock of Proleague.
Fortunately for us the fans, the team decided not to call it quits just yet, and instead took some action. During the mid season break, Evil Geniuses added the famed Coach Park as the new EG-TL head coach. Only two days after that, PuMa was released from EG due to his poor overall performance. And less than two weeks after that, aLive and Oz joined EG in order to reinforce their roster.
The so-called Coach Park Effect took action very quickly, with EG-TL breaking out of their loosing streak and winning their first 2 matches under the new coach. From the start of Round 4 until June the 13th, the team won 7 out of their 10 matches, their best showing yet, giving hope to all of us fans, and even switching out of the last place from time to time.
Finally though, on June 13th the team was mathematically eliminated from the playoffs; the big (and somewhat unrealistic) goal that the new EG-TL had made for itself. With that, it seems like the team relaxed and lost focus, proceeding to win only 2 of their remaining 6 matches and finishing their Proleague run in the last place, tied with Team8.
Overall, the team showed that they can compete in Proleague. If their long mid-season slump and their lack of motivation during the final weeks had not occurred, the team would most likely have made it to the playoffs. If they can avoid those loosing streaks and their players can improve a bit (or they get better players), and if the Unholy Alliance holds for the next Proleague season, I think EG-TL will no doubt become a legit contestant for the playoffs.
Honorable mention to STX Soul (and INnoVation), begining their run in the bottom part of the table, only to pull an impressive recovery in rounds 4-6, going from 7th to 3rd place and securing their place in the playoffs.
The Players
But how well has each player performed? Who is EG-TL's best player? Who is the worst? Let's look at their season performance:
Cumulative map wins for each player that played for EG-TL. Foreigners marked with black borders.
As we can see, HerO and Jaedong have been the team's most performing players, with JYP in a remarkable third place. These three players have won 56% of all maps won by EG-TL. TaeJa and Oz are tied for 4th place at 9 maps, TaeJa having gone through wrist problems, and Oz having amassed an impressive amount of wins for having joined only mid season. The foreigner award goes to Stephano, not only for being tied in the 6th place in total maps won after only playing for two rounds, but also for begin the most efficient EG-TL's player, with a 55% win ratio compared to HerO's 51%, TaeJa's 50% or JYP's 48%.
On the other hand, we can clearly see why PuMa was booted from EG, winning only 1 map out of 8 that he played. Proleague has also proven to be very inaccessible to the non-Stephano foreigners, with ThorZaIN being the only one able to grab 1 win out of 5 maps, and HuK and Snute grabbing none so far. Also, if I was Zenio, I would be pretty scared.
Evil Geniuses vs Team Liquid
But who performed better, EG or TL??
Cumulative number of map wins for the EG roster (Jaedong, JYP, Oz, Revival, Stephano, aLive, ThorZaIN, PuMa, HuK) vs the TL roster (HerO, TaeJa, Zenio, Snute). And Flash. For scale.
Counting the amount of maps won, we see that the EG players have won almost twice as many maps as the TL players. On the other hand, the full EG-TL roster consists of 9 Evil Geniuses players and only 4 Team Liquid players, so that accounts for the difference. In terms of win rate, the EG players won 41% of their maps, while the TL players won 45%.
Overall, it seems that every team contributed to the Unholy Alliance in their own way; you could say EG providing mostly the quantity and TL providing mostly the quality, but in general their performances are very comparable.
Honorable mention to KT.Flash, who by himself won more maps than all TL players combined. If Flash would join EG-TL, the team would hold the 1st spot in the league without any doubt.
Race performances
Finally, I grouped the players by their race of choice, to see if we could spot some differences.
Cumulative number of map wins for EG-TL Protoss players (HerO, JYP, Oz, HuK), Zerg players (Jaedong, Revival, Stephano, Snute) and Terran players (TaeJa, aLive, ThorZaIN, PuMa).
The team has been carried by the Protoss (46% of all maps won) and Zerg (37%) players, with the lack of Terran victories (17%) becoming pretty obvious in the graph. TaeJa having to face wrist issues throughout the season, and aLive joining the team half way (plus his not-so-stellar record) account for the differences. And it is not a problem of Terran balance with the Proleague maps; 2 of top 3 performing players of the whole league are the Flash and INnoVation, and the cumulative win ratios for the three races within EG-TL are not very far off: 37% for Terran, 40% for Zerg, and 46% for Protoss.
Overall though, it looks like EG-TL needs the addition of some other good Terran players to strengthen their roster, or they risk becoming a 2-race team.
Conclusion
EG-TL had an up and down wild ride this Proleague season. They won 6/13 and 7/10 matches in their good weeks, showing that they are able to compete in the league, but lost 7/8 and 4/6 matches in their two slumps. Their slumps can not be attributed to any single player, instead being a consequence of the whole EG-TL not performing. Luckily for us, the managers identified this and added coach Park, who brought the team together and broke their long slump. Separately, EG and TL's players performances are roughly equal, so no team can be said to be carrying EG-TL on their own. Finally, it's clear that EG-TL is in need of some Terran additions, to round the roster and make the team more competitive overall.
Let's hope the Unholy Alliance continues to play next season. If they solve their few problems, I am confident EG-TL can be a serious contender for the playoffs.
Finally, shoutout to Liquipedia and all its contributors, for providing all the data I used in this analysis. You guys rock! And thanks to TL for being such an awesome community!
Edit: Fuck it's late.. Any problems/typos you can spot, I won't be able to fix them until tomorrow.
Edit2: To all people asking why didn't I use win ratios in the graphs: I thought briefly about it, but win ratios only have meaning after a good number of matches, once they have converged to show the player's skill value. And after that, they would remain mostly flat since even if there is a skill change in the player, the calculation would still take into account all previous matches, dampening the change. So half the graph would be meaningless noise while the other half would be boring flatness, so overall the graphs would not be very informative. Cumulative wins on the other hand show progression, and also show losses (when there is a point in the graph but the number does not increase). It's not the perfect measure, but it's the better option of the two imho. If you are interested in each player final win ratio, you can check Liquipedia.
Also, thanks to TheMango for the TL+! Very much appreciated!
Wow great work that was realy intersting. Im hoping thy learnt alot from thos season and thy come back stromger if taeja can play more often that will help alot
I really hoped they performed better, sad that Jaedong is taking so long to become a beast. Overall if Taeja was OK and Stephano played all season they would made the playoffs
On July 10 2013 09:30 shell wrote: I really hoped they performed better, sad that Jaedong is taking so long to become a beast. Overall if Taeja was OK and Stephano played all season they would made the playoffs
With a few tweeks they will improve next year!
Seems like that pretty much. In fact it might have been close alone if Taeja had not had injury plague EG-TL's start so heavily.
I do indeed hope they have a stronger overall showing next time. The first few rounds were pretty annoying to watch (and read LR's of haha)....again assuming there is the next time. Most likely will be, just might be...odd given LoL (which I still don't fully understand tbh...)
On July 10 2013 09:13 randomsaint wrote: Really surprised that you would use cumulative wins and not SPL win percentages for the graphs, but good work anyway
I don't think there's any guarantee that they will be a playoff team next year, don't forget that all other teams will also train hard and probably improve immensely.
On July 10 2013 09:06 Gosi wrote: Interesting stuff. Hopefully they will give next season a go!
if there is a next season
Well apparently there is not.
eg/tl deciding not to go for another season because they suck?
Incontrol just said on ITG that they're thinking about not doing it because the ROI isn't that great and it's really expensive to play it.
What no!!!! i love EG-TL in Proleague and i believe that with a good coach like park they could of made it into the playoff
eg/tl making the playoffs? no.. maybe getting 7th place though.
Oh come on they didnt have an actual coach at the beginning, not to mention that they didnt really have a deep line up either. Now that most korean EG players live in the EG house along with coach Park they would def put up better results from the start and not be in such crappy position to start with.
My very own and VERY SUBJECTIVE opinion is that many of the losses of EG-TL players came after they get "drop harrassed to death while not build any static defenses at all to prevent or even help in defending against that". I have no idea if this is a real thing and a "bad trend of the team" and other people with more knowledge of the games played could perhaps confirm or deny it.
This is a pet peeve of mine, because if you try to defend against drops with units only you have to split up a significant part of your forces and this weakens your main army and most of the time a small but potent force is dropped in a base and requires a larger force that this to take care of quickly ... which leaves the opponent with a larger force than the defender. I really dont buy the "but your army will be smaller if you build static defenses" argument, because you gather resources over time and this will only delay you from growing for a short time and there are players who actually manage to do it.
On July 10 2013 09:06 Gosi wrote: Interesting stuff. Hopefully they will give next season a go!
if there is a next season
Well apparently there is not.
eg/tl deciding not to go for another season because they suck?
Incontrol just said on ITG that they're thinking about not doing it because the ROI isn't that great and it's really expensive to play it.
bahaha. Foreigners baby.
ROI is kind of entirely the purpose of a business. It's way more expensive for a foreign team to participate, especially since they're sending people all over the planet for other events, than it is for a korean team that just sits in korea.
I think being in the Kespa atmosphere and trying to be competitive in PL gives EG a better chance at tournaments outside of Korea whenever they do go to them. Having that gaming house in Korea with Coach Park gives them an edge over every other foreign team. If they're winning more, advancing deeper in tournaments and getting more brand exposure outside of PL because they have that PL infrastructure, isn't that a ROI in and of itself?
On July 10 2013 09:06 Gosi wrote: Interesting stuff. Hopefully they will give next season a go!
if there is a next season
Well apparently there is not.
eg/tl deciding not to go for another season because they suck?
Incontrol just said on ITG that they're thinking about not doing it because the ROI isn't that great and it's really expensive to play it.
bahaha. Foreigners baby.
ROI is kind of entirely the purpose of a business. It's way more expensive for a foreign team to participate, especially since they're sending people all over the planet for other events, than it is for a korean team that just sits in korea.
honestly i suspect they will sing a different tune if the results had been different and the team destroyed all competition in proleague and clinched 1st instead of last.
On July 10 2013 09:06 Gosi wrote: Interesting stuff. Hopefully they will give next season a go!
if there is a next season
Well apparently there is not.
eg/tl deciding not to go for another season because they suck?
Incontrol just said on ITG that they're thinking about not doing it because the ROI isn't that great and it's really expensive to play it.
bahaha. Foreigners baby.
ROI is kind of entirely the purpose of a business. It's way more expensive for a foreign team to participate, especially since they're sending people all over the planet for other events, than it is for a korean team that just sits in korea.
honestly i suspect they will sing a different tune if the results had been different and the team destroyed all competition in proleague and clinched 1st instead of last.
Well, they would have gotten a lot more attention and hype if they had done well, which translates to higher ROI (more value to the sponsors if the team does well)
If EGTL doesn't participate in PL next season I expect the level of play of most of their Korean players to drop (or at least, stop increasing). If nothing else, PL is good practice and a good motivator.
On July 10 2013 15:11 graNite wrote: the best thing about this was the thread in which they analyzed they will win this entire thing because of their stacked lineup :D also, "expensive to play" ? i think at least eg is one of the richest teams.
It's expensive if you're not getting your money back.
Very nice write up, but I also wonder why you are not using win% instead? But anyway the conclusions can still be drawn from the analysis. Really good job. I would love to see them in the next season, despite them not having a good ROI, they still get really good practice and experience for the players.
While I do think that if Coach Park was there from the beginning, Taeja had no wrist issue, Puma was off EG and they had aLive and Oz then EG-TL makes the playoffs or gets 5th, this thread does go to further detail the fact that EG-TL walked into Proleague completely unprepared and the effect that their preparation (however late) was able to have.
Somewhat more interesting is will EG-TL play in next seasons Proleague. My initial answer is no; I evidence this almost purely through the lack of ROI, although, also to Team Liquid's somewhat weak dedication to the team (from what I can tell, I, obviously don't know any background details). I mean Team Liquid did provide EG-TL's ace player in Hero, although what else? An injury ridden Taeja who barely played, the teams weakest korean player currently on the team in Zenio and Snute who lost every game he played. EG provided the bulk of the players for EG-TL in Jaedong, JYP, Revival, Stephano; the poorly placing Thorzain, Huk who also lost every game he played and Puma who just had a horrendous record, although was released from the team for his poor results and unwillingness to sign a lower valued contract; they also added aLive and Oz mid-season to try and boost the teams roster as well as footing the bill for the team house (It was called the EG Lab so I'm assuming they're footing the bill here) and the signing of Coach Park mid-season as well which was unarguably the best possible addition outside of signing Rain, Flash and INnoVation. Now I understand that looking at EG's sponsors and then comparing them to Team Liquid's sponsors it's clear why, financially, EG can do all of this and why, most likely, Team Liquid cannot. With that said, it has been a very large investment on both teams parts and I'm not trying to bash Team Liquid, I'm just laying out my thoughts from my obviously limited knowledge of the inner workings of both teams.
The only way I can see them playing in next seasons Proleague is if KeSPA offers some sort of guaranteed ROI for EG, which is a possibility, considering T8 found a sponsor, although still unlikely.
This post is slightly off-topic, although, I don't feel like much can be commented on other than will the changes made mid-season result in a payoff next season, which obviously drives the question, will EG-TL be playing in next seasons Proleague.
On July 10 2013 09:06 Gosi wrote: Interesting stuff. Hopefully they will give next season a go!
if there is a next season
Well apparently there is not.
eg/tl deciding not to go for another season because they suck?
Incontrol just said on ITG that they're thinking about not doing it because the ROI isn't that great and it's really expensive to play it.
bahaha. Foreigners baby.
ROI is kind of entirely the purpose of a business. It's way more expensive for a foreign team to participate, especially since they're sending people all over the planet for other events, than it is for a korean team that just sits in korea.
honestly i suspect they will sing a different tune if the results had been different and the team destroyed all competition in proleague and clinched 1st instead of last.
Uh obviously yes, because if that would have been the case the ROI would have been off the charts amazing?
I hope they try again, but it is incredibly expensive, and the other teams are incredibly good - hard to make it worthwhile.
On July 10 2013 09:06 Gosi wrote: Interesting stuff. Hopefully they will give next season a go!
if there is a next season
Well apparently there is not.
eg/tl deciding not to go for another season because they suck?
Incontrol just said on ITG that they're thinking about not doing it because the ROI isn't that great and it's really expensive to play it.
What no!!!! i love EG-TL in Proleague and i believe that with a good coach like park they could of made it into the playoff
eg/tl making the playoffs? no.. maybe getting 7th place though.
Oh come on they didnt have an actual coach at the beginning, not to mention that they didnt really have a deep line up either. Now that most korean EG players live in the EG house along with coach Park they would def put up better results from the start and not be in such crappy position to start with.
You are forgetting they are not the only ones improving. They need to improve more then the others teams that take Proleague really serious. Do you honestly think that is possible?
On July 10 2013 09:06 Gosi wrote: Interesting stuff. Hopefully they will give next season a go!
if there is a next season
Well apparently there is not.
eg/tl deciding not to go for another season because they suck?
Incontrol just said on ITG that they're thinking about not doing it because the ROI isn't that great and it's really expensive to play it.
bahaha. Foreigners baby.
ROI is kind of entirely the purpose of a business. It's way more expensive for a foreign team to participate, especially since they're sending people all over the planet for other events, than it is for a korean team that just sits in korea.
honestly i suspect they will sing a different tune if the results had been different and the team destroyed all competition in proleague and clinched 1st instead of last.
Uh obviously yes, because if that would have been the case the ROI would have been off the charts amazing?
I hope they try again, but it is incredibly expensive, and the other teams are incredibly good - hard to make it worthwhile.
I'm sure they will convince themselves with all kinds of excuses. Quitting is quitting.
Too bad that the teams were riddled with bad luck on Taeja's injury. I feel like together with him and stephano maybe having more fun in korea to stay longer, could have made a big difference.
Really disappointed with how many TL users are bashing the results and hoping that they wont do a 2nd season in PL... I'm totally clueless how anyone could say such a horrible thing for something that we enjoy together.
Hope what incontrol said will not come true, i have never been so excited and hyped for a team playing in a league since i watched SC2.I even got a friend who doesnt play sc2 much to enjoy Proleague with me and he is now an almost bigger fan than me. And all that thanks to the EGTL and Proleague hype.
On July 10 2013 20:14 Quateras wrote: Too bad that the teams were riddled with bad luck on Taeja's injury. I feel like together with him and stephano maybe having more fun in korea to stay longer, could have made a big difference.
Really disappointed with how many TL users are bashing the results and hoping that they wont do a 2nd season in PL... I'm totally clueless how anyone could say such a horrible thing for something that we enjoy together.
Hope what incontrol said will not come true, i have never been so excited and hyped for a team playing in a league since i watched SC2.I even got a friend who doesnt play sc2 much to enjoy Proleague with me and he is now an almost bigger fan than me. And all that thanks to the EGTL and Proleague hype.
It's not that we're hoping that there isn't a 2nd season of Proleague for EG-TL, although, we're being realistic and realistically there isn't a very large chance they will be playing a second season of Proleague.
On July 10 2013 20:14 Quateras wrote: Too bad that the teams were riddled with bad luck on Taeja's injury. I feel like together with him and stephano maybe having more fun in korea to stay longer, could have made a big difference.
Really disappointed with how many TL users are bashing the results and hoping that they wont do a 2nd season in PL... I'm totally clueless how anyone could say such a horrible thing for something that we enjoy together.
Hope what incontrol said will not come true, i have never been so excited and hyped for a team playing in a league since i watched SC2.I even got a friend who doesnt play sc2 much to enjoy Proleague with me and he is now an almost bigger fan than me. And all that thanks to the EGTL and Proleague hype.
They are the worst team in proleague, their players stream and go to foreign tourneys, and it seems like they have to beg for their foreigners to even stay there. The fact that Stephano complained about it, left, and is still on the team is just priceless.
If they aren't going to take PL as seriously as all the other KeSPA teams, then I'll be quite happy if they announce they will not be returning.
Very nice article, some really interesting graphs to sum up the season. You're awesome OP!
Although EGTL didn't perform as well as I'd hoped, it really was a blast watching the games (maybe especially because I was unfamiliar to the proleague format prior to this season) REALLY hope to see the unholy alliance continue next season!!
Please, please, please try again EG-TL. I always made an effort to catch their matches (even if it meant falling asleep to the sweet sweet sounds of SC2).
Pulling out due to poor ROI would be a bit of a cop out, wouldn't it? Did they seriously expect to make the playoffs in their first year, or strike rich? Here I was thinking it was a long term project and they were aiming to build a legacy in the Korean scene. I guess it was just a half-hearted, or an ill-thought experiment.
Thanks for the analysis! I've been thinking about doing something similar for a while.
I, too, would love for EG-TL to be back for at least another season of Proleague, simply because it'd be interesting to see if Coach Park, given the chance to prepare and lead the team right from the get-go, can really make them a playoff contender. Not playing in Proleague anymore, I'm sure the team house and the coaching staff would also be on the table. If that all goes away, what will remain? All players going their merry individual ways, living at home, practicing alone, all that which will definitely take a toll on the performance of all the players. Jaedong will probably go back to a KeSPA team and be much less accessible to Western fans again. After the WCS fallout that saw foreign players and teams seemingly flee the country, the West stands to lose one of its final footholds in Korea. Is that really what we want?
And like others have already mentioned, the Unholy Alliance has helped keep a lot of people interested in an otherwise rather closed-off, at times pretty dull all-Korean tournament. If KeSPA truly cares about Western audiences, maybe this will be impetus for them to lower the league enrollment fees (for foreign teams at least) to convince ROI-minded organizations to stay. It'd be a real shame if things ended after just one attempt. But I guess I can only hope and wait, and cross my fingers, quite possibly in vain.
I think its worth it for them to do a 2nd season of proleague for the sake of growth of the players and keeping JD. I dont think JD will stay with EG if he doesnt continue in proleague. Also, look what playing in proleague has done for Hero's confidence. In general, the preparation and stage experience is priceless. I don't see why they even bother with Korean lineups if they dont want to compete in Korea, so I'm sure that they will do another season.
EGTL must get more terran and try to keep JD or they are really gonna run out of viable players on the team. snute still isn't there yet skillwise, huk and zenio are both in a huge slump.
Really hoping that they go again next season! EG-TL are pretty much the reason I watch pro league and they can definitely do well under coach park as they have shown at the end of this season.
The lack of really up and coming talent in mostly TL but also EG comes apparent in this analysis. With only EG getting Xeno and TL I guess getting Snute(but that was much earlier) their team lacks in real depth. Other teams in pro league have an a team and a b team aka they have enough PLAYERS to have a b team. I hope that TL and EG start academies soon to grow and foster talent. I'm tired of EG and TL acquiring players at their prime only to see them tumble down.
On July 11 2013 00:17 KaiserKieran wrote: The lack of really up and coming talent in mostly TL but also EG comes apparent in this analysis. With only EG getting Xeno and TL I guess getting Snute(but that was much earlier) their team lacks in real depth. Other teams in pro league have an a team and a b team aka they have enough PLAYERS to have a b team. I hope that TL and EG start academies soon to grow and foster talent. I'm tired of EG and TL acquiring players at their prime only to see them tumble down.
Well you cant expect someone to be at the top forever. What goes up must come down.
Nice write-up, but I'm not sure 'number of wins' is a good measure. Win % would be a more interesting statistic imo for a couple of reasons:
1.) EG have more wins than TL in EG-TL, but they probably have more losses too, purely because they have a larger line-up of players who feature in Korea.
2.) Oz has probably outperformed JYP and perhaps even Jaedong on win %, but purely because he has not been on the team for the whole season he finishes lower on your 'top performer' list as he can't realistically have as many wins.
On July 11 2013 03:02 Honner wrote: Nice write-up, but I'm not sure 'number of wins' is a good measure. Win % would be a more interesting statistic imo for a couple of reasons:
1.) EG have more wins than TL in EG-TL, but they probably have more losses too, purely because they have a larger line-up of players who feature in Korea.
2.) Oz has probably outperformed JYP and perhaps even Jaedong on win %, but purely because he has not been on the team for the whole season he finishes lower on your 'top performer' list as he can't realistically have as many wins.
Still, interesting reading either way.
Not sure how it's an interesting read if you didn't actually read it...
There are win %s all over the OP, and both of your points are explicitly answered.
On July 11 2013 03:02 Honner wrote: Nice write-up, but I'm not sure 'number of wins' is a good measure. Win % would be a more interesting statistic imo for a couple of reasons:
1.) EG have more wins than TL in EG-TL, but they probably have more losses too, purely because they have a larger line-up of players who feature in Korea.
2.) Oz has probably outperformed JYP and perhaps even Jaedong on win %, but purely because he has not been on the team for the whole season he finishes lower on your 'top performer' list as he can't realistically have as many wins.
Still, interesting reading either way.
Not sure how it's an interesting read if you didn't actually read it...
There are win %s all over the OP, and both of your points are explicitly answered.
Actually I read it all, but good job getting butthurt over someone else having an opinion I guess??
I meant showing win % over time on the graphs, rather than number of wins. and I think both my points still stand.
TL has a higher win % than EG in Proleague, which is (arguably) more relevant than who won the more matches (given that EG have more players and play more matches.
Oz also outperformed JYP (not to knock JYP, I think he had a decent season also), but is only given lip-service for having a good run. It would at least be interesting to compare his wins to the other players for the period he has been on the team, which again can be shown with % (or number of wins in the same period of time or something). Just seems kind of unfair to undervalue the contribution of players who haven't been there for the whole season.
I guess I was just hoping for more details/statistics about how Oz (and Alive) performed comparatively after joining up.
Don't like the way you put the graphs, the team that has more players is most likely going to have more wins, instead I think win rate should of been used opposed to number of maps won
Edit: Agree with poster above me, and I think we're both trying to say the same thing.
That thread gave hope to me . I would've loved to see Lucifron in EG or TL (ofc in EGTL!). That might've been the strong terran player they needed. Though I'm not sure about Lucifrons true strength compared to full-time koreans. Sad to see Thorzain slumping.
I hope that rather than pull out prematurely EG-TL will actually learn on past mistakes and improve in the next season. They already made a few decent decisions, albeit a tad too late. Leaving proleague will only hurt their players anyway.
On July 10 2013 21:34 Telcontar wrote: Pulling out due to poor ROI would be a bit of a cop out, wouldn't it? Did they seriously expect to make the playoffs in their first year, or strike rich? Here I was thinking it was a long term project and they were aiming to build a legacy in the Korean scene. I guess it was just a half-hearted, or an ill-thought experiment.
On July 11 2013 04:04 True_Spike wrote: I hope that rather than pull out prematurely EG-TL will actually learn on past mistakes and improve in the next season. They already made a few decent decisions, albeit a tad too late. Leaving proleague will only hurt their players anyway.
Thanks everyone for the comments (and for the TL+)! I had some good fun making these statistics!
On July 10 2013 21:56 StarStruck wrote: All I want to know is who put you up to this? lol.
I did it for Science!!
I've seen some comments regarding the lack of win ratios, like this one:
On July 11 2013 03:02 Honner wrote: Nice write-up, but I'm not sure 'number of wins' is a good measure. Win % would be a more interesting statistic imo
which I addressed in an edit in the OP, but to reemphasize: basically I think win% is a fixed value for each player, and that a time course of it would only show fluctuations and slow convergence to that value, which to me was not very interesting. I understand it is still an informative value, and this is why I commented on its values on several parts of the analysis; but if you are missing some you can check them all in the Proleague Statistics page of Liquipedia.
On July 11 2013 03:54 tili wrote: The only thing I'd be interested in seeing is which races/teams they performed worst against and why. Map analysis might also be interesting...
I also thought of trying to figure out if they had lost more often to some race than the others, or to some other team for that matter.. But it was already 2 in the morning and that analysis would be far more complex than what I did here, so I ruled that out. If someone is up to the challenge, it would be pretty interesting to see!
On July 11 2013 01:19 Monsen wrote: Conclusion? Flash *zoom* AAHAAAAAAAAAAA
I was about to write exactly this in the conclusions xD
On July 10 2013 18:56 Liquid`Jinro wrote: Uh obviously yes, because if that would have been the case the ROI would have been off the charts amazing?
I hope they try again, but it is incredibly expensive, and the other teams are incredibly good - hard to make it worthwhile.
(Yeah Jinro in my thread! Go Jinro!!) To add to this discussion: I was unaware that iNcontroL had already said that there is a good possibility that EG-TL won't be continuing for the next season... That would be a real shame I think. For me this season was a fun ride, but I was always thinking that they would do much better next season, with the players already used to the Proleague format and with a competent coach that can keep the team together. The only thing they seem to need is to form a small and consistent core of players (current or new) whose main goal would be to focus on Proleague, rather than to fly to tournaments around the globe too often. With that, they should be set and ready to take it to the playoffs at least.
On the other hand, as some posters have already pointed out, if EG-TL was to 'disband' and leave Proleague, it's a possibility that Jaedong would then go back to Team8 (now Green Wings?) since he is technically on a lease. Stephano is going to retire this August, so that would leave the EG roster without two of their absolute best players. I don't think that would be a good move for the team, but maybe they can manage to keep Jaedong without competing in Proleague, who knows. Alternatively, if STX were to disband due to their economic problems, then EG.INnoVation would be a real possibility (which would make me an EG fan for lyfe! xD). For Liquid, personally I think they should let go of Zenio, since has been consistently underperforming for at least a year and he showcases zero personality, making him difficult to justify. And in his place grab some other Terran player, like they already attempted with Liquid`Sea which unfortunately did not pan out.
But well, I guess we'll just wait and see what ends up happening with this.
Total player wins doesn't say much though when people played massively different amounts of games. OK Zenio won 2 maps since like March. How many games did he play? That 2 win increase means nothing.
Coach Park joins. Suddenly players stop winning? Stop being played? A good thing would be a summary win % for the play pre and post Park, if anything, or a cumulative games played chart as well as wins, since the player graph means absolutely nothing as-is.
On the other hand, we can clearly see why PuMa was booted from EG, winning only 1 map out of 8 that he played
No, we can't clearly see that. We can see that he had one win, total, from an unknown number of games.
Cumulative wins on the other hand show progression, and also show losses (when there is a point in the graph but the number does not increase)
No it doesn't, it shows cumulative wins. It tells you absolutely nothing about losses when there are 13 players with only up to 4 playing in any one team match. That tells you that someone won if they played, it doesn't tell you about losses.
I know it's being somewhat nit-picky, but IMO while the graphs are nice and all, they don't really say anything about EG-TLs performance, because wins in isolation mean absolutely nothing. You could show a baseball team winning 60 games in a year, and a football (soccer) team winning 10. The baseball team could have a 25% winratio and the soccer team might also have a 25% winratio.
"But Lonyo, they play different numbers of games in a baseball season vs football (soccer) season". Exactly, that's my point. Terran got 17 wins, Protoss got 46 or something. Does that mean the protosses were over twice as good as the terrans? No, it means they probably played over twice as many games. The text below the graphs says a lot more than the graphs say, which is unfortunate, because picture blah blah 1000 words.
The information is there, but it's not presented in a meaningful way IMO.
Well everyone should have expected that their low number of players will own them. Anyway it was nice to see them make adjustments to fix that. So hope they will stick around since I think it really helped some players out.
Speaking of RoI, if nothing else I think the practice environment and Coach Park might have additional benefits, beyond that of competing in Proleague.
HerO started terribly in HoTS and has really come on, won WCS NA, and a top 4 in an MLG and a Dreamhack. Oz and Alive are being rehabilitated after poor spells on Fnatic etc. Yeah perhaps PL is too much of a drain, but equally the training environment that their players benefit from can snowball into benefits for the teams in terms of individual results and exposure.
I really hope EG-TL will try again to compete in Proleague. Besides the round 3 (1-6), they made a decent record in every round (3-4 each time).
And it was pretty obvious that the ROI wouldn't be good as only the finalists earn money (and I don't even know if the prize pool covers all the expenses of the season).
Now that it is mentioned.. Since Coach Park was hired:
Hero won WCS NA, top 4 MLG & Dreamhack Jaedong got pretty far at MLG, second at Dreamhack, top 4 at another Dreamhack, only losing to Protoss Oz and Alive are actually pretty competitive again Revival took second in WCS NA. Taeja won HSC, top 4 in Dreamhack Snute took second in HSC & won ESET UK
So while Zenio + JYP don't have many notable accomplishments outside PL since then, JYP did play well at PL and I'd say most players are actually in an upward swing or remaining pretty consistent. Even Ret and especially TLO seem to be doing better than before Park haha
Anyway, I hope they try for at least one more season. There's no arguing they had a bad start but now they know what to expect. I don't see Innovation coming over to EGTL as he doesn't really seem to care for foreign tournaments, but either way, with 1 or 2 additions to the team they can actually make it far. I'm just going to hope (:
Hm now that I've realized that the SC2 League announcement was posted by iNcontroL himself, stating that "We want the SC2L to become the Western world's premier team league", and announcing that both Liquid and EG will compete in it, I find it more and more likely that they have already ditched the idea of a second Proleague round.
Sad that they rather be the big fish in a small pond.
On July 11 2013 19:04 Ender985 wrote: Hm now that I've realized that the SC2 League announcement was posted by iNcontroL himself, stating that "We want the SC2L to become the Western world's premier team league", and announcing that both Liquid and EG will compete in it, I find it more and more likely that they have already ditched the idea of a second Proleague round.
Sad that they rather be the big fish in a small pond.
I dont think such a league can be successful. The best teams have lots of koreans in them, who are also their best players. Who is the target audience?
People watching to see high level sc2 --> SPL/GSL People watching to be entertained --> will mostly see foreigners getting slaughtered by Hero/MMA/JD People watching to see foreigners --> will get old pretty quick after realising the skill gap
I think your post is great and attempts to bring to discussion an issue on many of our minds but I think that evaluation of a player's performance should be by the rate of their improvement rather than the total number of games won. I think that if you take a look at the rate of increase or decrease in the number of maps won per short period of time (the slope/derivative) it's a much better indication of the improvement that players have made. The method I'm suggesting would show if players are actually improving rather than just winning games at their normal rate and accumulating wins (as most players do) throughout the season.
On July 11 2013 09:17 Neemi wrote: Now that it is mentioned.. Since Coach Park was hired:
Hero won WCS NA, top 4 MLG & Dreamhack Jaedong got pretty far at MLG, second at Dreamhack, top 4 at another Dreamhack, only losing to Protoss Oz and Alive are actually pretty competitive again Revival took second in WCS NA. Taeja won HSC, top 4 in Dreamhack Snute took second in HSC & won ESET UK
So while Zenio + JYP don't have many notable accomplishments outside PL since then, JYP did play well at PL and I'd say most players are actually in an upward swing or remaining pretty consistent. Even Ret and especially TLO seem to be doing better than before Park haha
Anyway, I hope they try for at least one more season. There's no arguing they had a bad start but now they know what to expect. I don't see Innovation coming over to EGTL as he doesn't really seem to care for foreign tournaments, but either way, with 1 or 2 additions to the team they can actually make it far. I'm just going to hope (:
You might want to thank Oh Glorious Leader for e-sports while your at it. All jokes aside, all of those things would have happened with or with out him. Just saying.
Not necessarily Star, I mean Oz post-Park and joining EGTL is starting to resemble the FXOz and EGTL's training environment has got to play some part there.
On July 16 2013 10:19 Wombat_NI wrote: Not necessarily Star, I mean Oz post-Park and joining EGTL is starting to resemble the FXOz and EGTL's training environment has got to play some part there.
You want to look at Oz pre-Park? He was coasting on Western teams. Give me a break. Yeah, playing in the same house with those boys would have done it regardless. It's takes time to get comfortable. Not that much weight on Park. Heck, trOt even knows how to work em, but that has little to do with him as well in the same vein as all the other teams.
On July 16 2013 10:20 Muecke wrote: Conclusion: EG-TL needs better Terrans.
hmm, it seems unlikely to me that egtl will stay in proleague for another season. but this would mean that proleague is back to square one with too few teams..
overall, i think the proleague/gstl merger should finally happen. that would be such a tremendous boost to the whole scene.....
oh, and kudos to the "flash for reference" joke, literally got me rofling.
On July 16 2013 10:19 Wombat_NI wrote: Not necessarily Star, I mean Oz post-Park and joining EGTL is starting to resemble the FXOz and EGTL's training environment has got to play some part there.
You want to look at Oz pre-Park? He was coasting on Western teams. Give me a break. Yeah, playing in the same house with those boys would have done it regardless. It's takes time to get comfortable. Not that much weight on Park. Heck, trOt even knows how to work em, but that has little to do with him as well in the same vein as all the other teams.
On July 16 2013 10:20 Muecke wrote: Conclusion: EG-TL needs better Terrans.
Conclusion: it will only get better from here.
I think you're just overcompensating for the overhyping of Coach Park which is prevalent on the boards.
Part of the improvement was maybe a team change for Oz especially, and also being in a house with that calibre of practice partner which would have happened sans Park, but I do feel he's had some impact as well. Don't wish to take away from the player's work either, and perhaps they would have had the same results if they were practicing independently
Wow HerO getting like all the wins for TL haha. HerO/Jaedong carrying them wasnt enough. Also notice how at the end of Wings of liberty, EGTL only won 2 games after the all-kill phase, those being Stephano and JYP. Shows how quickly Kespa adapted to SC2.
On July 16 2013 10:19 Wombat_NI wrote: Not necessarily Star, I mean Oz post-Park and joining EGTL is starting to resemble the FXOz and EGTL's training environment has got to play some part there.
You want to look at Oz pre-Park? He was coasting on Western teams. Give me a break. Yeah, playing in the same house with those boys would have done it regardless. It's takes time to get comfortable. Not that much weight on Park. Heck, trOt even knows how to work em, but that has little to do with him as well in the same vein as all the other teams.
On July 16 2013 10:20 Muecke wrote: Conclusion: EG-TL needs better Terrans.
Conclusion: it will only get better from here.
I think you're just overcompensating for the overhyping of Coach Park which is prevalent on the boards.
Part of the improvement was maybe a team change for Oz especially, and also being in a house with that calibre of practice partner which would have happened sans Park, but I do feel he's had some impact as well. Don't wish to take away from the player's work either, and perhaps they would have had the same results if they were practicing independently
Maybe? Overcompensating? PL couldn't have gone much worse than it did. Oz and aLive joined very late and these guys have been roaming for a while man. When you aren't in game shape and playing a whole lot in a scene like Korea. It's going to take time to readjust and I'd say they were quite convincing like Revival when he first joined. Trot was already working them and certain players like Stephano didn't like the system. I'd say anytime you take players out of their comfort zone your moving in the right direction and if we want to talk stats. EG-TL were in quite a number of Ace Matches prior to Coach Park making his appearance. They had one really bad round and we could make all the excuses in the world but at the end of the day, things were only going to go up from there. It would have sorted itself out. You guys focus way too much attention on these guys and coaching staff. Way too much. As for the independently shit? What are you talking about.. it's like trot doesn't even exist your world. Glad Boxer, January etc. doesn't have to deal with this level of bullshit.
It's not to say that Trot is completely incompetent, indeed tbh I see as much of EGTL's improvement as being due to getting a decent roster of Koreans on the EG end of things, comparing some of the recent lineups to some of the ones that were being sent out early it's pretty obvious why they have looked better of late.
Coaching staff get over-praised for the achievements of their charges perhaps, not just in SC but in the sporting world in general. That said there are better and worse coaches, and yeah maybe things would have evened out as you say. Why would you not pay attention to coaches in at least some capacity, unless the oft-repeated teamhouse/coach model being a contributory factor of Korean is completely fallacious?
I don't think it was just Stephano who didn't like the system prior to the coaching rejig, but things I've seen to that effect could just be work of the rumour mill.
Taeja's absence (literally and metaphorically) throughout the season hurt them the most, I think. EG-TL would have been an entirely different team with a strong ace player. At the beginning of the season there were a number of candidates for ace, but Taeja had been great for a while, and seemed like the most likely candidate (the other strong candidates were Hero, Jaedong, and Stephano). Even if Taeja hadn't turned into a strong ace, he could have been a solid part of the lineup, someone to help get a few more wins without having to get to ace. Instead he crashed out with his wrist issue. Hero eventually stepped up to the plate, but you can't really say that EG-TL had a star. Also, pre-Park it seemed like ace player selection was pretty shaky. It's hard to know what was going on behind the scenes, of course... maybe JYP was rocking everybody in practice, and Hero was sucking. But as a fan it's hard to watch a terrible ace match when there are players you've watched tear through tournaments sitting on the bench.
I really hope they stay in for another season... I love watching Hero in proleague. Jaedong will stay in proleague (probably on team 8) for sure. Of course, it would be even better if GSTL merged with proleague, and we just had one league for the best players.
On July 16 2013 11:42 Wombat_NI wrote: It's not to say that Trot is completely incompetent, indeed tbh I see as much of EGTL's improvement as being due to getting a decent roster of Koreans on the EG end of things, comparing some of the recent lineups to some of the ones that were being sent out early it's pretty obvious why they have looked better of late.
Coaching staff get over-praised for the achievements of their charges perhaps, not just in SC but in the sporting world in general. That said there are better and worse coaches, and yeah maybe things would have evened out as you say. Why would you not pay attention to coaches in at least some capacity, unless the oft-repeated teamhouse/coach model being a contributory factor of Korean is completely fallacious?
I don't think it was just Stephano who didn't like the system prior to the coaching rejig, but things I've seen to that effect could just be work of the rumour mill.
It had a lot to do with the roster man. Just because you hear a few players complain doesn't mean the system doesn't work. trOt has a whole wealth of knowledge and who do you think he worked with prior? Recent line-up changes? Don't get me started on that because I could pick apart of every team in the league and likewise, because you have more vocal EG-TL fans you see it way more often but people do criticize the other teams all the time.
I'd put way more weight on the lack of roster and there were a lot of pick-ups during the scene. Not just the fact EG had to forge an alliance with TL, which was a great PR move at the same time. Not only that but they picked up Jaedong at the same time. So you had two credible international players plus Zenio at your disposal. Hwanni brings in trOt. Team is still pretty barren so they bring in Revival, Oz and aLive who have experience in both the Korean and foreign scenes mid-season. The more guys you have in the house the better, especially if they can communicate with one another the better. Bringing in the other Park is just the icing on the cake in reality. SKT1 BW staff reunion.
munchmunch,
TaeJa's absence definitely didn't help them. Then again, a lot of players were travelling a whole lot. It sucks when you only see four players on the bench at times lol. Where your practice partners at? ho ho ho ho.
Again, those are all factors that I have been pretty consistently agreeing with. When EG picked up Alive and especially Oz (who is a very preparation-centric player) I felt those two added a lot to even out the lineup.
I just initially felt your post was something of a contrarian viewpoint, a counterbalance to the 'all praise to Coach Park,' whereas subsequently you have shown that not to be the case. Much of my initial thoughts on that were really in response to me perhaps misinterpreting what you had initially posted, my bad if that's the case.
On July 16 2013 11:44 munchmunch wrote: Taeja's absence (literally and metaphorically) throughout the season hurt them the most, I think. EG-TL would have been an entirely different team with a strong ace player. At the beginning of the season there were a number of candidates for ace, but Taeja had been great for a while, and seemed like the most likely candidate (the other strong candidates were Hero, Jaedong, and Stephano). Even if Taeja hadn't turned into a strong ace, he could have been a solid part of the lineup, someone to help get a few more wins without having to get to ace. Instead he crashed out with his wrist issue.
I second this. but in addition to that, the lack of taeja also meant the lack of any good terran. therefore, the opposing teams could devote more of their practice time to zerg and protoss.
thus, the lack of taeja basically also meant the lack of one out of 3 dimensions on the team, so that the opponents were better prepared for egtl than egtl for them, given equal practice time.
On July 17 2013 09:24 00Visor wrote: strange statistics
Number of maps won is pretty skewed by number of maps played
You should use win percentage.
number of maps played directly reflects how well the player did in inhouse ranking tournaments and the likes. therefore, map score is not as bad a measure as you think.
On July 17 2013 09:24 00Visor wrote: strange statistics
Number of maps won is pretty skewed by number of maps played
You should use win percentage.
number of maps played directly reflects how well the player did in inhouse ranking tournaments and the likes. therefore, map score is not as bad a measure as you think.
With a lineup like Startale I'd agree, but this is EG-TL where at one stage they only had the bare minimum amount of players.
I think Taeja is more or less hiding behind the wrist thing. he barely ever played in proleague, but his play rate everywhere else didn't change at all. and you'd often see him streaming during EGTL matches. if he can stream, he can play.
EPT![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/treehugger/proleague_590x300.jpg)
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. I would've loved to see Lucifron in EG or TL (ofc in EGTL!). That might've been the strong terran player they needed. Though I'm not sure about Lucifrons true strength compared to full-time koreans. Sad to see Thorzain slumping. 
Also i still want a unholy alliance tshirts :D
