Road to BlizzCon 2019: Neeb (#3 WCS Circuit)

So, What's Up With Neeb?

by Wax

Here's a thought experiment. Let's say that you, a die-hard fan of competitive StarCraft II, had gone outside for a stroll following the conclusion of the 2017 WCS Global Finals, only to trigger a Stasis Ward deviously placed on your doorstep by your Protoss neighbor (you scratched his Warp Prism while parking your car last week). This Stasis Ward, being particularly OP, would have kept you frozen in time for nearly two years, wearing off just in time for upcoming the 2019 Global Finals.

Obviously, you'd immediately head to the TL.net forums to get caught up on all the major StarCraft II happenings you missed. We'd excitedly tell you about how Maru won an unprecedented four consecutive Code S tournaments, how Serral won the 2018 Global Champion, and how soO finally broke his second-place curse among other historic events. And you, still in your 2017 state of mind, would probably interrupt and ask "Yeah, but what happened to Neeb?"


I mentioned how 2016 feels like ancient history in our preview for Dark—now that I think about it, even the pages from the book of 2017 are starting to become yellowed and musty.

After unleashing his potential by becoming the first foreigner to ever win a championship on Korean soil in the 2016 KeSPA Cup, Neeb went on to surpass all expectations by dominating the 2017 WCS Circuit and winning the title in three out of four tournaments. His performances against Koreans continued to be top-tier by the standards of 2017, defeating sOs to reach the top eight of GSL vs. The World and taking a series off of Rogue in the group stage of the Global Finals (though he would lose the rematch).

Looking back on the one-year reign of Neeb as top foreigner makes you realize how much Serral's 2018 has distorted our perception and standards. In 2017, it actually felt like a landmark moment when we gave the #8 rank for on the BlizzCon Power Rank (as opposed to #9, behind every single Korean), and some members of the notoriously Korea-favoring TL.net community actually demanded for him to be ranked even higher. For a fan in 2017, Neeb's marathon victory against late-game master Rogue might have actually been the top highlight of the entire Global Finals, as evidenced by the fact that it has accrued the 2nd most YouTube VOD views after the grand finals.




Anyway, back to that question from the hypothetical, temporally thawed, 2017 version of you. "What happened to Neeb?"

Not much, actually! And that's a good thing. Even though Neeb was completely overshadowed by an even more historically amazing player in Serral, he's still an excellent player and arguably the second best Circuit representative headed to the Global Finals.

Yes, I know that Reynor is technically one spot ahead of Neeb in the WCS Circuit standings at #2, and leads him two-to-one in terms of Circuit championships on the year (especially unflattering for Neeb considering the relatively weak competition at WCS Winter: Americas compared to Europe). It's also undeniable that Neeb's WCS Circuit results have dipped radically since his three-championship performance in 2017. Some of that is due to Serral, as Neeb has drawn playoff matches against the Finnish Phenom twice during the 2019 Circuit. But even prior to that, Neeb had been dropping playoff series to many of the foreign elite, such as Reynor, ShoWTimE, and even MaNa during his run of destiny at WCS Austin 2018. The rest of the Circuit really has improved as a whole, which means Neeb is now liable to be upset by his Circuit peers the same way he shocked Korean opponents in the past.

However, the Global Finals is no Circuit event (duh). In mixed-region tournaments, Reynor's resume—or that of any of the non-Serral representatives from the Circuit—simply does not compare to that of Neeb's. Just this year, Neeb achieved top eight at IEM Katowice, top eight at WESG, and top four at GSL vs. The World (his worst finish was a Ro16 finish at ASUS ROG Summer with two losses to Zest). That's quite easily the best combined international results of any foreigner not named Serral, even taking Elazer's runner-up finish at GSL vs. The World into account. Of course, if you want to run up the score, you could also throw in Neeb's historic KeSPA Cup win and his Code S semi-final run in season three of 2018 (the best foreigner result since Jinro in 2011).

All that goes to say that the 2019 version of Neeb feels very much like the versions from 2016, 2017, and 2018 headed into the Global Finals. He may not be one of the absolute, top players at the tournament, but I'm certain the Koreans are going to point him out as one of the scariest foreigners they could possibly face. And unlike most occasions, it's not going to be polite, empty lip-service when they say it: they've seen Neeb beat plenty of their peers before.



Really, I'm counting on the Korean players to hype Neeb up because he certainly won't do it himself. One of the most confounding things about Neeb's consistent very-goodness for the last three years has been his demeanor. Humility and self-deprecation are a common undercurrent in pro-StarCraft II, but Neeb takes it to an almost comical level. His comments before GSL vs. The World 2019 are quite telling: No, he doesn't particularly feel like playing in Code S again—one semi-final appearance was perfectly satisfactory. He conveyed the same sentiment at August's WCS Fall, where he seemed rather content and resigned to his fate after drawing a semifinal match against Serral. And if you missed it at the time, you might still have a laugh reading his supposed 'hype' interview with sponsor Ting after his career-best 2017 campaign, where he offered up some gems such as "...it honestly feels like the foreigners got a little bit worse compared to last year ... I definitely improved but not enough where I should just be winning every event." and predicted a Korean beatdown at BlizzCon (SpeCial went on to place top four).

I can only assume this is all a part of Neeb's long-term, galaxy-brain master plan to make sure everyone underestimates him. After all, what else would explain the fact that he keeps telling everyone that he sucks, but he still continues to do better than almost everyone else?

One last thing: After Neeb said he was satisfied with reaching the top four of Code S once and didn't have much motivation to compete again, he followed that up by saying he was looking to do better at bigger tournaments such as IEM Katowice and BlizzCon. I don't have much hope at nabbing a TL.net interview with Neeb before the Global Finals, but what if in his fourth consecutive appearance, he finally said "I'm confident in my skills and I think I have a shot at beating everyone." That would be something, wouldn't it?

Ah well; it was just a thought.