Starcraft 2 is a 1v1 game. And because of that it becomes natural for the stories, narratives and attention to generally be focused on the champions of tournaments, the players that can climb to the top of the scene and lift the trophy over the rest of his peers. This article seeks to rectify that. Team leagues have been a part of SC2 since its inception and have been the breeding grounds for the majority of SC2 players. Originally, this article started off as a power rank of the greatest SC2 team league players of all time, but the more research I did, the clearer it was that such a ranking was impossible. The formats, player pools, competition level and timelines made it impossible to create a coherent framework for a unified ranking.

For instance, take Proleague. No one can deny that it is by far the hardest and best team league in SC2’s history. But even within Proleague itself, there are inconsistencies. The 2012-2013 format had a Bo7 SPL format, whereas future iterations had Bo5 round robins with alternating all-kill format in the round playoffs. The former had far more games over its year-long history, but the latter had more prestige and arguably more pressure as there were way more fans in attendance. This doesn’t even go into the varying GSTL formats which ranged from 8 team single bracket elimination to double bracket round robins in either Bo7 all-kill or Bo9 all-kill formats. And while Proleague features more games, and thus should arguably be harder, it also means that players' scores are padded. It doesn’t matter how many times Prime plays against SKT, KT, CJ or JA; they will always lose. At the same time the team league formats before SPL generally kicked out all of the weaker teams because of the much faster format, meaning aces for those teams got fewer chances to pad their stat sheets. At the same time though, ace players don’t need to super hard carry their teams in SPL format because they can only be fielded twice per match (once in the roster, once as ace) whereas in all-kill format, it was possible to get 4 or 5 kills in a single outing.

Given all of that however, I picked out the best team league players across all five years based on their overall records, importance to their teams, all-kills and ace wins, and playoff performances. In particular, three players stood out above the rest when it came to team league achievements in the last five years, and they will be explored in the last section of these team league articles.

The Great Team League Players

sOs, The Million Dollar Man

In terms of pure numbers put on the board, sOs has been the most consistent player since Proleague's inception in SC2. He played on Woongjin Stars until they disbanded before being signed by Jin Air. His overall records were 32-15, 26-18 and 25-16. However, you have to consider the numbers in the context of his teams and his role in the team. Woongjin Stars was probably the strangest team that ever existed in Proleague. They had two really strong players in sOs and Soulkey but neither were actually aces in the traditional sense. Their job was usually to secure the first 1-2 games, at which point the Woongjin Stars backline would clean up the series within the next 4 games. This was helped by Ryu Won, who often gave his players favorable matchups or at least a chance at victory. In the Woongjin Stars' one year in Proleague, they were only ever forced to play an ace match 5 times out of 42 total Proleague matches. While sOs was an important piece in the Stars lineup, the overall team depth and coaching was what made that such a dominant team.



His time on Jin Air has been different. For all of 2014, he and Maru were the two aces of the team. The problem with sOs was that when it came to ace matches, he failed more than he won, with a 1-4 record during that year. However, his playoff performance was strong, as he got a triple kill against Samsung in Round 3. 2015 SPL was his best showing as he put up the numbers during the regular rounds, but also carried the team with two all kills against CJ and KT, taking the most wins for JA in the playoffs against nearly every team they went up against.

• SPL 2013: 32-15 | 1-0 in ace matches
  
• SPL 2014: 25-13 | 1-4 in ace matches
  
  • 3x Kill Samsung: Shine, Stork, RorO
• SPL 2015: 27-17 | 0-1 in ace matches
  
  • AK CJ: herO, RagnaroK, ByuL, Bbyong
    
  • Reverse AK KT: Flash, TY, Zest, Stats

GuMiho, The Specialist

Among all the players on this list, GuMiho is an exceptional case. Every other player on this list has won multiple championships, and has at one point or another been considered one of the Top 3 players in their race, if not the world, for extended periods of time. It makes sense that the best team league players generally also happen to be some of the best individual league players. GuMiho is the exception. Along with Leenock as his co-ace and Choya as coach, the three of them would create one the most successful GSTL teams of all time with 2 victories and a Ro4 in the most competitive era of GSTL along with its best formats.

What makes GuMiho an even weirder case is that his team didn’t revolve around him, but more around Leenock and coach Choya’s great ability to counter pick opponents with surprising and effective snipers. His overall records in the GSTL were 9-3 and 6-3, and in Proleague it was 9-3 and 5-3. However, the way he came about those stats is what’s interesting. On CJ, he was never used as a stable core of the lineup despite his overall strong record (and ability to beat the best player of 2014 after a booth was dropped on his head).



In contrast, on teams led by Choya, GuMiho often clutched out the most important matches for the team, all-killing Slayers 5-0 in the GSTL Finals and triple killing MVP in the second GSTL finals. In SPL he has gone 1-1 in ace matches, but due to the lack of skill and depth of MVP compared to other teams, they weren’t able to get much further. If there were ever a case where a player seemed to get exponentially better when he was in team leagues compared to his usual skill, GuMiho was that player.

The Rising herO

Among all of the aces in SPL, herO has had the most linear progression of results. Which is really interesting when you consider that for a majority of players, results rarely come in a constant slope. They come in waves, there are ups and downs, but not so in herO’s case. Just look at his record in Proleague for the last three years:

• SPL 2013: 28-21 | 2-4 in ace matches
  
• SPL 2014: 26-18 | 5-4 in ace matches
  
• SPL 2015: 25-16 | 2-3 in ace matches

In the first year of SPL, herO wasn’t even the biggest contributing player on his team (It was Hydra). The year after that, he became the clear ace of his team (going 5-4 in ace matches for SPL 2014). By the third year of SPL, CJ had a new 2nd man in ByuL and Bbyong was still reliable so it didn’t get to ace matches quite as often. An interesting player when you notice that his results mirror his own individual league performances unlike players such as TY or Solar.

God in his Domain

In the first few years of play, no matter how many times he disappointed his fans, no matter how many times the hype trains crashed, Flash was always able to deliver in Proleague. In many ways, his 2013 and 2014 were actually fairly similar. Flash would carry his team while Zest and TY would put on really good performances to ensure their playoff spots. The biggest blot of his career however was his 2015 season, where he performed abysmally for the entirety of the year until his triple kill in the playoffs at the last second. A very dramatic decline, but still one of the better team league players despite his 2015 season.

• SPL 2013: 44-21 | 2-4 in ace matches
  
• SPL 2014: 23-16 | 3-2 in ace matches
  
• SPL 2015: 14-18 | no ace matches

The Vanguard of KeSPA

The first player that made it big after the KeSPA switch was Rain. It wasn’t surprising as he was already a rising star in the BW scene and was picked to be a big future prospect. While that potential never had time to be fulfilled in BW, it seemed to have transferred over perfectly in SC2 as he became one of the biggest protoss players in 2012. He was instrumental in the creation of what we now know as the PvP matchup and became SKT’s first new star in their SC2 squad. While his run in Proleague was only 2 years, it was a very strong 2 years. Rain is also the only player to be worth 11 points in an FPL round (2013) in history (both Maru and Flash have reached 10).

• PL 2013: 36-22 | 3-3 in ace matches
  
• PL 2014: 21-10 | 4-1 in ace matches

The Man from Busan

DRG was a strange person to pin down when it came to team leagues, particularly because of the way MVP used team leagues. He was initially used as an ace for the team in the early GSTLs and had a triple kill against the now defunct team of oGs. He became MMA’s one true rival in both team leagues and individual leagues, and hard carried his team in the first official GSTL Season 1 where he 3K’d oGs, 3K’d SlayerS and AK’d Prime. And at that point, he was almost never used again except in ace match situations. Much like Incredible Miracle, team MVP used team leagues mostly to foster the growth of their other team members. Unlike IM however, they were incredibly successful while fostering that growth meaning that DRG rarely got to come out for team leagues since. The next time we saw him was in his two seasons of Proleague, where he did okay in 2014 (bar the miraculous MVP run) and really well in 2015. Still one of the great team league players in SC2, but hard to pin down because of the way his team rarely used him.

• GSTL 2011 May: 5-1
  
  • 3K oGs: Nada, SuperNova, MC
• GSTL 2011 Season 1: 13-2
  
  • 3K oGs: Nada, HerO, Cezanne
    
  • 3K SlayerS: BoxeR, GanZi, MMA
    
  • AK Prime: MKP, Anypro, B4, Polt
    
  • Playoffs 3K IM: Happy, YongHwa, Losira
• SPL 2014: 10-14
  
• SPL 2015: 9-3

The Boy Wonder

Despite already having a huge player for Proleague in sOs, I contend that the biggest pickup Jin Air ever made was actually Maru. In two seasons of play he ended his 2014 season as the player with the most wins, and his 2015 season as the player with the second most wins. He has been a consistent ace player for Jin Air and has often gone big for them no matter how well or poorly the rest of his team fared. Not only did he routinely put up the wins in round robin play, but he almost always came big in every playoffs he was a part of. Among all the players on this list, he comes the closest to joining the pantheon of Greatest Team League Players to have ever played SC2.

• SPL 2014: 30-15 | 4-3 in ace matches
  
  • 3K MVP: Billowy, DRG, TAiLS
    
  • 3K CJ: Bunny, Hydra, herO
    
  • 3K KT: Flash, Sleep, TY
• SPL 2015: 27-16 | 4-3 in ace matches
  
  • 3K KT: Zest, Life, Stats
    
  • AK KT: Zest, Life, Stats, Flash

The Greatest Team League Players of All Time

While I was unable to rank any of the team league players in any kind of coherent Power Ranking, there were three players who stood above the rest when it came to team league results.

Mr. Team League

MMA made it on my list as one of the greatest players of all time. Yet there is an entire other side of MMA’s story that has nothing to do with his individual results, and that is the steadily amazing and strong performances he’s put on in nearly every team league he has ever entered. In many ways, the team league has been home field for MMA. It is the place where he first rose to become a huge name in the scene. It is the place where he recovered from his slump after leaving Korea. It is the place that has become almost synonymous with his name. While he doesn’t have the incredible heights that INnoVation or TaeJa had in contrast, his work has been very consistent and he was a major part of how both SlayerS and Acer reached and won so many team league finals.

• GSTL 2011 March: 5-1
  
• GSTL 2011 May: 3-0
  
• GSTL 2013 Season 2: 5-2
  
• ATC 1: 31-14
  
• ATC 2: 17-3
  
• ATC 3: 16-10

Total Titles: 6

The Super Ace

In terms of pure results, no one tops INnoVation in team leagues. He was on three different teams, entering 5 team leagues—2 ATCs, 1 GSTL and 2 Proleagues. He won them all. The only thing that doesn’t make him the default best team league player of all time is that he was also on really strong teams for the majority of those runs, barring his time on STX, where he really hard carried. In his GSTL run, he was with Axiom—a team that had just come third the season before without his or MMA’s help. In the 2 ATCs he shared ace duties with MMA, and while he put on more numbers in the regular season, MMA pulled really heavy weight in those team leagues as well. Finally his latest Proleague title came with SKT where he wasn’t even the biggest contributor on his team (he was second to soO). Even more insane was that the next three players of SKT were Dark, Classic and Dream with records of 17-12, 15-8 and 12-6 respectively. Yes, he was an important part of SKT, but SKT ran 5 deep in a league that requires only 4 player slots.



Even in those circumstances, he is still one of, if not the greatest, Team League player SC2 has ever produced and has always been one of the core players as to whether or not a team wins the league.

• ATC 2: 20-7
  
• ATC 3: 38-8
  
• GSTL 2013 S2: 12-2
  
• SPL 2013: 44-20 | 3-1 in ace matches
  
• PL 2015:18-7 | 1-0 in ace matches

Total Titles: 5

The Super Hard Carry

TaeJa is again an anomaly. Unlike the other two players, he does not even have a team league title to his name. His biggest and majority claim to fame however was his IPL TAC 3 run. To understand the magnitude of the run, I will Power Rank the strength of the teams before the event started:

1. IM
   
2. StarTale
   
3. Prime
   
4. MVP
   
5. SlayerS
   
6. FXO
   
7. TSL
   
8. NSHS
   
9. Team Liquid

Team Liquid were the 9th best team in the league. He took a 9th place team and carried them all the way to 2nd place. Yes, he had some assistance from HerO and others, but Taeja almost single-handedly enabled this entire run against 8 of the best Korean teams in the world. Here are the results he had to pull off to make this happen:

• Prime AK: Annyeong, B4, Creator, Maru, MKP
  
• MVP 2K: TAiLS, Vampire
  
• ST 4K: Life, Curious, Squirtle, Bomber
  
• SlayerS 4K: Genius, CoCa, Min, Puzzle
  
• IM AK: Seed, YongHwa, Losira, NesTea, YoDa
  
• IM 2K: First, YongHwa

That is the single hardest run anyone has ever had to do in a team league in SC2. No run even comes comparably close. To put it into modern day terms, it's as if Proleague switched to all-kill Bo9 format, INnoVation switched teams to Prime, then proceeded to all-kill Samsung, ST-Yoe, CJ, Jin Air, KT, and SKT 1.5 times. That was the relative difficulty that Taeja had to overcome with his run.

Also he did well in some ATCs, but really all of Taeja’s greatness in team leagues comes from that single run alone.

• IPL TAC 3: 23-3
  
• ATC 1: 21-15
  
• ATC 2: 20-12
  
• ATC 3: 14-6