I initially thought I was fairly lonely in my assessment of Rain, and that placing him first on this ranking would be overly generous. Then almost every person I talked to agreed that Rain is both one of the favorites to win GSL and a candidate for the ever-elusive title ”Best player in the world.”, at which point my assessment felt more validated.

So let's look at what Rain has done recently:

• Helped SKT's playoffs campaign immensely, beating Hush, Hydra, Bbyong, herO[jOin] and Zest.
  
• Advanced comfortably from Group E, beating Rogue and Zest
  
• Qualified for the KeSPA Cup via qualifiers, beating Curious, Hydra and a resurgent Life.
  
• Went a combined 23-6 in July and August against almost exclusively top-level players.

Not only this, but in doing all of the above Rain looked indomitable. Much like when he originally broke out as "The Assassin" in 2012 GSL Season 4, Rain needs no curveballs or tricky plays to dismantle his opponents. He revels in standard play, feeling no need to resort to trickery or low blows. For most players, this would be a weakness, a predictability that can only cause trouble in the long run. For Rain, it's testament to his strength more than anything. Many times, his opponents will know what is coming and still be helpless to stop it. With no clearly discernable weakness but a multitude of strengths ranging from the early game to the extreme late-game, Rain might very well be the best player in the world at this very moment.

For Maru fans, August was an unfortunate month. Not because Maru played badly – as always, he performed as we have come to expect of him – but because his reign over the international circuit that was supposed to begin with IEM Toronto was cut short. Originally supposed to play in the Open Bracket (a narrow loss to Flash in the qualifiers prevented direct seeding into the group stage), Maru instead declined participation merely days before the event, presumably to focus on the upcoming individual leagues and ensure qualification for Blizzcon via GSL and the KeSPA Cup.

Unfortunately for Maru, he was set back significantly by recurring nemesis Effort. Eliminated from the KeSPA Cup qualifiers and not participating in IEM Toronto, all we're left with is his annihilation of Group C and a relatively strong playoffs performance in SPL. Make no mistake, Maru still plays well enough to warrant being #2 on this ranking, but his lack of appearances and stray losses here and there over the summer (Nado who?) puts him short of the top spot and with a few questions that demand answers.

With his victory at IEM Toronto and one of the best individual months in terms of results a player has ever had in Starcraft 2, Flash (suddenly) takes the giant leap from being a good (but not always great) Terran to a player at the forefront of the Korean scene. He played a key role in KT's victory over SKT, beating his long-time rival Parting in a match most put in favor of his opponents. With the momentum swinging way after KT's championships, he went on this streak. For the full list of his matches in August, click the spoiler below.
+ Show Spoiler +

If you said anything except "That's insane" when looking at the list above, you may not have pressed the spoiler correctly. Last fall, Flash estimated that he would need another year to reach the level of skill that made him unbeatable in Brood War. Fall is coming, and it actually looks like Flash might make that happen after all.

"As summer casts its last light begins to dwindle the summer of Taeja"

Putting aside overdramatic quotes, Taeja remains one of the best players in the world. Why else would back-to-back silvers in premier tournaments seem like a disappointment? He won three championships over the course of the summer, finished second at Red Bull Detroit and fell just short of making another finals as he was eliminated by an absolutely on-fire Flash in the Ro4 of IEM Toronto, where no one else could beat him. His latest championship at IEM Shenzhen demonstrated the full range of his skills very clearly, as he took down. Life, Zest and Solar - all recognized players in Korea - to win the championship. Say what you will about the level of players Taeja faces compared to what passes for "stacked" in Korea, but there really is no denying that even when he faces a combined force like the one that assembled in Canada this weekend, Taeja will almost always delivers both the games and the results he wants to stave off retirement for another year

That said, he has also had a few bumps along the road over the last month. He suffered a puzzling 0-2 loss to Leenock at the Taiwan Open, got blindsided by Action in the KeSPA Cup qualifiers, fell flat against Polt in Detroit and struggled against Zest before finally being eliminated by Flash in Toronto. Not a shameful series of displays by any means, but a notch below what we've come to expect from the international bounty hunter.

Zest rose to fame by walking the Royal Road in a time when the Korean scene was almost completely void of Terrans. As such, it makes sense that he would struggle most against the race he is the least experienced against. Omit Terrans from Zest's record, and he still looks much like the nigh-unbeatable player he was when he won dual titles earlier this year. Unfortunately, a multitude of Terrans are now legitimate threats. A few months ago, one might win a tournament without ever having to truly worry about facing a threatening Terran. But now the racial distribution in tournaments has evened. As long as Zest cannot overcome his PvT woes, he will continue to find himself struggling against players like Cure, Polt, Taeja or Flash.

While his teammate soO makes up in results what he lacks in flair, Parting sometimes seems to be his polar opposite. Even when his results take hits, Parting seems to never lose his footing completely, and always win with style. When faced with Bbyong's shenanigans in the SPL playoffs, Parting calmly picked him apart. When faced with the prospect of an early elimination from the GSL at the hands of Dear, Parting rebounded in the final match and advanced over the player that had beaten him handily a few hours prior. Making a better case for himself in the playoffs by playing a key part in SKT's victory over CJ while also advancing from his GSL group, Parting remains strong enough in all three match-ups to place him squarely in the middle of the ranking.
Whether or not his unwillingness to create another absurd group via the group selections shows a lack of confidence or a greatly delayed realization that easy groups are good for you remains to be seen.

Being soO isn't easy. No one can say that he isn't good (or even the best Zerg in the world). As the only player to ever reach three consecutive GSL finals and one of few to maintain impeccable consistency over a long stretch of time, you would think that he could be higher on this list. Unfortunately for soO, he also belongs to an exclusive group of players without a gold to their name despite multiple finals appearances (four, counting the SPL finals). Further, all I see when I watch soO play is a style of Zerg completely lacking flair. Efficient, but rarely awe-inspiring. To me, soO is very reminiscent of Innovation in his prime, but he lacks the aura of complete invincibility that made Innovation the star in everyone's eyes despite his formulaic approach to the game.

soO was relatively quiet in August, advancing from his group in GSL without any major trouble barring a lost game to Trust and dropping to series online to Flash and Classic. Looking back, he also beat Sleep fairly easily in the SPL finals and looked good enough in the games leading up to the playoffs that I can't realistically dispute his place on the Zerg throne, but also tanked a few key losses to CJ in the semifinals that make me question his abilities.

If Polt hadn't already been assigned the nickname "Captain America", I feel like he would have been promptly added to the list of Kongs (Captain Kong) for his performances this year. After narrowly barely not making the cut for Red Bull D.C three events in a row, and finishing second behind Trap at MLG Anaheim, Polt finally managed to lift a trophy in Detroit, where he absolutely crushed Taeja in the finals. Polt might be a mixed bag in terms of results, sometimes suffering puzzling losses to players like Apocalypse or Daisy when he looks otherwise solid, but with how thoroughly he dismantled the opposition in Detroit, it would be unfair not to give him recognition.

Innovation may be a far cry from the merciless machine that tore through every tournament he participated in a year ago, but I must give him credit for his endless dedication to rebuilding himself. After his transfer to Acer, many thought that he would drop off and never return. With focus and hard work, Innovation has proven those people wrong. He isn't back to what he once was yet, but he has been ironing out the flaws in his play as they appear for a long time, and all that hard work is beginning to show off.
And of course, the fact that the widow mine is now back to what it was when no Zerg in the world could consistently stop him has to feel good.

Someone recently described Cure as a "Poor man's Maru", which is a very apt description. Subscribing to the same school of Terran his Jin Air teammate belongs to, Cure has recently grown to become a real threat in Korea. With no clear weakness in any match-up, he went 20-3 in matches in August and took down at least one elite player of each race. Two months ago, Cure beating Rain, Solar and Zest would have been quite the upset. Today, that is not the case. Now, he looks like someone in contention for a championship rather than one of the stragglers doing their best to make Code A. By now, we have learned that Cure has a skillset that is just as diverse as Maru's, and while he may yet lack some of the finesse that makes Maru the best Terran in the world, he looks well on his way.

Snute has always been a solid and respected European Zerg, but in 2014, he has become something more. Over the past several months, Snute has beaten Korean players from all regions and in all formats. He defeated Stork and TRUE at IEM Shenzen, took down MMA and Innovation in Acer Teamstory Cup, and beat both of his Korean teammates at weekend events. He is one of the few foreigners with a winning record against Korean players over the summer, and has had plenty opportunities to practice his vKorean matchup these past few months. His performance this summer alone would have landed him in the top three, but what really pushes him to the number one spot is the way he played at IEM Toronto. Advancing out of the open bracket by twice defeating CJherO, Snute had already impressed everyone heading into the group stage. There, he defeated a different and even more fearsome Protoss player in sOs to make it out of his group in first place. A foreigner in the final eight of such a stacked tournament was unexpected and frankly a little miraculous. Snute’s final series of the tournament, his quarterfinal matchup against eventual champion Flash, proved to be a heartbreaker for Snute fans as he took the first two games of the Bo5 but was reverse swept and knocked out of the tournament. However, it almost didn’t matter. Snute had already proved to himself and to the world that he was capable of taking on the best of the best from Korea, and that is why he takes the top spot on the foreigner power rank.

Sen has long been one of the top foreigners in Starcraft, from Broodwar to SC2. However, he has also had a curse for the entirety of SC2, being unable to finish higher than 3rd place in Premier tournaments. Always leading the Taiwanese scene, the HK Attitude Zerg was constantly giving Koreans a run for their money. Sen hasn’t had much WCS success recently, and Scarlett just narrowly defeated him 3-2 in Challenger to keep him out of Premier this season, but that matters little compared to the reason that Sen is on this list. Sen has achieved something that a foreigner hadn’t done in over a year and half: he won a Premier tournament. His run at the Taiwan eSports Open was impressive, and Sen has prevented a second straight Korean shut-out of Premier events with his win. We don’t see much of Sen outside of Taiwan anymore and it may be a long time before he plays in another strong Premier event, but three weeks ago in front of his home crowd he proved himself to be one of the world’s best foreigners.

Bunny has been absolutely on fire over the last two months, and he shows no signs of stopping as he has earned his spot in the line of the best foreign terrans that began with Jinro. Bunny was considered to be on the rise for some time, but he didn’t truly break out until July. Faced with the toughest Challenger League opponent possible in the recent Dreamhack Champion Sacsri, Bunny stayed poised and reverse swept his way into Premier League. Bunny then attended the Gfinity G3 tournament (to qualify he beat YoDa, Patience, Sleep, and Armani) and there he truly started to impress. He bested top European talent like Snute, TLO, and StarDust, then went on to beat Hyun in the grand finals. He then finished second in the PughCraft Invitational, where he notably 3-0’d current GSL quarterfinalist Cure. Combine that with victories over Kane, Huk, Oz, and Polt to finish top twelve, and Bunny is clearly one of the best non-Koreans in the scene.

After a slow start to 2014 following her second place finish at ASUS ROG Northcon, Scarlett seems to have hit her stride once again this summer. She began by capping off a win at Red Bull Battlegrounds North America in spectacular fashion by defeating Polt 6-1 in their final three sets. She followed that up with a performance at MLG Anaheim that will go down in Starcraft II history for a number of reasons. First, she Hyun, Life, puCK, Ragnarok, and DongRaeGu. Second, she finished fourth at the event, one of the best finishes by a foreigner in a Premier event this year. Finally, her race picking against DRG won her both the hearts of the fans as well as the series, and that is a game that will be remembered for a long time. Scarlett has also seemingly overcome her struggles in WCS and is now back in the round of 16 after two seasons of disappointment. The Canadian Queen of Blades seems to be back in form, and when she is, she is one of the best Zergs in the world.

MajOr is having himself a pretty good summer and is putting legitimate pressure on Scarlett in the race for best player in North America. He is once again in the round of 16 in WCS America, and he has been performing well outside of WCS as well. Besides winning Copa America, which has become to MajOr what IPL Fight Club was to Hyun (MajOr has won six straight Copa America events) he also beat StarDust in the Warhounds Season 4 final, carried Mexico to the finals in Nation Wars II, and holds a dominant 5-0 record against Polt over the last month. MajOr has looked head and shoulders above most of his North American competition this summer and he doesn’t show signs of slowing down. With his frighteningly good TvT and an all Terran group in the Round of 16 in WCS, MajOr looks like he has the potential to be the first North American in the quarterfinals of WCS since Scarlett in Season 2 over a year ago.