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It's an interesting case study.
On February 06 2024 08:42 Charoisaur wrote:
My main disagreement is using the h2h from Maru vs Serral for anything conclusive, imo it's just not particularly relevant.
Everyone in this thread agrees on this point. Nobody defends the asinine notion that the GoaT status should be determined by individual head-to-head records between the contenders. And yet, every other commentator attacks this straw man.
Some pages back, I wrote that I consider head-to-head essentially the most important criterion, so far as it is applied to the whole of the top-tier field. And of course, the tacit assumption was that what counts are high-stakes matches in major or premier tournaments considered over a sufficiently significant period of time, not weekly cups, nor random low-stakes matches, nor temporary peaks (some other straw men attacked by some). Here is what I wrote:
On February 05 2024 08:15 Antithesis wrote:
Attempting to declare Maru the all-time GoaT, while simultaneously conceding that Serral is superior in terms of head-to-head record, not only to him, but also to the rest of all other top-tier players to me is a contradiction in terms.
Here is how WombaT put a similar view:
On February 06 2024 05:19 WombaT wrote:
For me the H2H bolstering his claim for Serral isn’t his over Maru, it’s him having a winning record against basically everyone, including Maru.
Nobody is making the claim that Serral's individual record against Maru is of any particular relevance.
Furthermore, a good – and in the case of Serral, the best – overall head-to-head record against all other top-tier players, in major or permier tournaments, over an extended period of time, evidently equates to good results in terms of most other metrics discussed here, like tournament wins and consistency. Which, too, is reflected in Serral's factual results. Up to this point, nothing about this is really controversial.
Now, of course, it's perfectly fine to argue that achievements stretched over a longer period of time and across more formats, as accomplished by Maru, are more impressive than a higher and more consistent level of dominance over a shorter period of time. Personally, I do not agree with this, but it's a perfectly reasonable position.
But it's simply disingenuous to pretend that anyone is making the case for Serral on the grounds of his individual record against Maru.
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Northern Ireland25030 Posts
On February 06 2024 08:42 Charoisaur wrote:Show nested quote +On February 06 2024 08:11 Balnazza wrote:On February 06 2024 07:13 Charoisaur wrote:On February 06 2024 06:35 Balnazza wrote:On February 06 2024 03:32 Charoisaur wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:41 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:38 WombaT wrote:
[quote]
Federer is a good few years older than Djokovic, and latterly had some pretty consistent injury issues in a very physical sport. But the results are there and Federer did poorly. The rest is just imagination Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately. Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol?Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list? Not sure how that's related in any way to my point? My point is that Mbappe outperforming Messi during the time they both played at PSG doesn't mean he's the all time greater player My dude, in their mid-twenties most (E)Sports-athletes reach their prime, not fall off. And it is not like other players aren't playing this game for 12 years straight either. There is just not an excuse for a claimed GOAT to "lose motivation" at this stage and time... On February 06 2024 04:24 Poopi wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:41 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:38 WombaT wrote:
[quote]
Federer is a good few years older than Djokovic, and latterly had some pretty consistent injury issues in a very physical sport. But the results are there and Federer did poorly. The rest is just imagination Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately. Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol? Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list?  Winnings/2018 almost all zergs over performed 2018 wasn’t the worst offender, it was around the same as late 2017 & hydra buff in terms of Zerg being strong, 2019 was the worst, then it kinda maintained around 2017-2018 level the following years Maru was the only Terran getting any success in 2018 though, it’s quite clear looking at the winnings If you look at the winnings by Top 10, I don't feel Zerg stands particularly out? Sure, by a larger margin Zerg earned the most (I mean...zerg also one two out of the biggest events). But by the 5th place Terran and Zerg are already equal again. Considering the persistent you have to point out how balance affected Serrals rise SO much, I would have expected something like "the 10th best Zerg wins as much as the 2nd best Terran". Not a maybe slightly misaligned, but overall completly normal spread ._. Holding against Maru that he didn't stay 100% motivated for 14 years so we could see his best version vs Serral's best version is pretty disingenous I think considering Serral hasn't done that either/didn't need to do that due to his shorter career. Do you really think keeping your 100% drive & competitive spirit for 6 years is as hard as it is to do that for 14 years? If in 8 years Serral is still just as dominant as he is now, then you can hold it against Maru that he didn't keep his 100% motivation for 14 years - not now. Of course it is hard and an achievement in itself to stay relevant for so long - but it is also easier to do that when you start so young, especially considering that Maru didn't have to deal with military service (yet). But it works in both ways: You can't hold it against Serral to have started out "late", especially when the reasons for it are mostly out of his hand anyway. These "What If"-scenarios can get out of hand pretty quickly, so I don't think that is in any shape or form helpful. You are basically replacing a non-helpful H2H with a theoretical H2H that doesn't work out either. What my point against Maru here is, is that even in his prime he wasn't "the one". Maru ramped up his trophy-cabinet in the same time-span as Serral, but didn't do is as well as him. If Maru "in his prime" (which I will just take from you and others, I personally don't agree with the whole idea) had won 3-5 GSLs I could see your point, but as I said before: You are basically saying just "being relevant, but never the best" for a long period of time is enough to qualify as the GOAT for you. It is a bit like the soO-case: Of course it is impressive how consistent he reached those (GSL) finals, but wouldn't you say to be 'the best GSL player ever' you at one point have to win the thing, too? And not just be "up there" long enough? Sure I agree with you (although I think his 2013-15 results are more impressive than you give him credit for, due to how stacked that era is). My argument is not that Maru is definitely the Goat over Serral (I'd give him the edge but it's basically a toss up imo). My main disagreement is using the h2h from Maru vs Serral for anything conclusive, imo it's just not particularly relevant. Serral got lucky that the majority of his matches against Maru were during the timeframe where he had the edge.
I’ll only concede the point if you also concede Maru was lucky to be placed to have a career spanning basically the entirety of pro SC2 :p
I dont think Balnazza is underrating his 2013-2015, least from my read. More that he was ‘one of the best’ rather than ‘the guy’. He was always hanging around as a top player, placing consistently and his subsequent Proleague record attests to that but say, an Inno or Zest were blowing him out of the water in terms of winning things consistently in HoTS, then subsequently early LoTV.
Well blowing out of the water is hyperbolic, but you get my point.
*Edit* it’s not even that hyperbolic. 2013, 2015 and then 2018 with WESG, which got him up to 3 Premiers. Quite a while, although there’s a lot of consistent top 4 finishes there. Then the rest of his 12 remaining titles all come from 2018 onwards.
Whereas someone like herO picked up 5 between 2013 thru 2015, including a Starleague himself. Inno has 4 from that same period, with 2 Starleagues. Etc
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On February 06 2024 10:05 WombaT wrote:Show nested quote +On February 06 2024 08:42 Charoisaur wrote:On February 06 2024 08:11 Balnazza wrote:On February 06 2024 07:13 Charoisaur wrote:On February 06 2024 06:35 Balnazza wrote:On February 06 2024 03:32 Charoisaur wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:41 Charoisaur wrote:
[quote]
But the results are there and Federer did poorly. The rest is just imagination
Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately. Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol?Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list? Not sure how that's related in any way to my point? My point is that Mbappe outperforming Messi during the time they both played at PSG doesn't mean he's the all time greater player My dude, in their mid-twenties most (E)Sports-athletes reach their prime, not fall off. And it is not like other players aren't playing this game for 12 years straight either. There is just not an excuse for a claimed GOAT to "lose motivation" at this stage and time... On February 06 2024 04:24 Poopi wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:41 Charoisaur wrote:
[quote]
But the results are there and Federer did poorly. The rest is just imagination
Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately. Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol? Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list? Winnings/2018 almost all zergs over performed 2018 wasn’t the worst offender, it was around the same as late 2017 & hydra buff in terms of Zerg being strong, 2019 was the worst, then it kinda maintained around 2017-2018 level the following years Maru was the only Terran getting any success in 2018 though, it’s quite clear looking at the winnings If you look at the winnings by Top 10, I don't feel Zerg stands particularly out? Sure, by a larger margin Zerg earned the most (I mean...zerg also one two out of the biggest events). But by the 5th place Terran and Zerg are already equal again. Considering the persistent you have to point out how balance affected Serrals rise SO much, I would have expected something like "the 10th best Zerg wins as much as the 2nd best Terran". Not a maybe slightly misaligned, but overall completly normal spread ._. Holding against Maru that he didn't stay 100% motivated for 14 years so we could see his best version vs Serral's best version is pretty disingenous I think considering Serral hasn't done that either/didn't need to do that due to his shorter career. Do you really think keeping your 100% drive & competitive spirit for 6 years is as hard as it is to do that for 14 years? If in 8 years Serral is still just as dominant as he is now, then you can hold it against Maru that he didn't keep his 100% motivation for 14 years - not now. Of course it is hard and an achievement in itself to stay relevant for so long - but it is also easier to do that when you start so young, especially considering that Maru didn't have to deal with military service (yet). But it works in both ways: You can't hold it against Serral to have started out "late", especially when the reasons for it are mostly out of his hand anyway. These "What If"-scenarios can get out of hand pretty quickly, so I don't think that is in any shape or form helpful. You are basically replacing a non-helpful H2H with a theoretical H2H that doesn't work out either. What my point against Maru here is, is that even in his prime he wasn't "the one". Maru ramped up his trophy-cabinet in the same time-span as Serral, but didn't do is as well as him. If Maru "in his prime" (which I will just take from you and others, I personally don't agree with the whole idea) had won 3-5 GSLs I could see your point, but as I said before: You are basically saying just "being relevant, but never the best" for a long period of time is enough to qualify as the GOAT for you. It is a bit like the soO-case: Of course it is impressive how consistent he reached those (GSL) finals, but wouldn't you say to be 'the best GSL player ever' you at one point have to win the thing, too? And not just be "up there" long enough? Sure I agree with you (although I think his 2013-15 results are more impressive than you give him credit for, due to how stacked that era is). My argument is not that Maru is definitely the Goat over Serral (I'd give him the edge but it's basically a toss up imo). My main disagreement is using the h2h from Maru vs Serral for anything conclusive, imo it's just not particularly relevant. Serral got lucky that the majority of his matches against Maru were during the timeframe where he had the edge. I’ll only concede the point if you also concede Maru was lucky to be placed to have a career spanning basically the entirety of pro SC2 :p
Ofc that's also true
I dont think Balnazza is underrating his 2013-2015, least from my read. More that he was ‘one of the best’ rather than ‘the guy’. He was always hanging around as a top player, placing consistently and his subsequent Proleague record attests to that but say, an Inno or Zest were blowing him out of the water in terms of winning things consistently in HoTS, then subsequently early LoTV.
Well blowing out of the water is hyperbolic, but you get my point.
*Edit* it’s not even that hyperbolic. 2013, 2015 and then 2018 with WESG, which got him up to 3 Premiers. Quite a while, although there’s a lot of consistent top 4 finishes there. Then the rest of his 12 remaining titles all come from 2018 onwards.
Whereas someone like herO picked up 5 between 2013 thru 2015, including a Starleague himself. Inno has 4 from that same period, with 2 Starleagues. Etc
Yeah I never said he was the best during that era. I just think being one of the best and achieving what he did during that era is extremely impressive. Back then if you had a bad day in the ro32 you got eliminated right then and there, whereas nowadays if you have a bad day you still probably make it into the ro8 and then just need to win three more series to win the trophy.
It's hard to say exactly how much more a trophy from that era should count compared to one in todays era, but it definitely should count a lot more. Players like Rogue, Stats and TY played throughout that era without winning a single tournament!
That's my problem with Balnazza saying he "only" won 2 Starleagues during that era, as if it was a negative point
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On February 06 2024 09:37 Antithesis wrote:It's an interesting case study. Show nested quote +On February 06 2024 08:42 Charoisaur wrote:
My main disagreement is using the h2h from Maru vs Serral for anything conclusive, imo it's just not particularly relevant. Everyone in this thread agrees on this point. Nobody defends the asinine notion that the GoaT status should be determined by individual head-to-head records between the contenders. And yet, every other commentator attacks this straw man. Some pages back, I wrote that I consider head-to-head essentially the most important criterion, so far as it is applied to the whole of the top-tier field. And of course, the tacit assumption was that what counts are high-stakes matches in major or premier tournaments considered over a sufficiently significant period of time, not weekly cups, nor random low-stakes matches, nor temporary peaks (some other straw men attacked by some). Here is what I wrote: Show nested quote +On February 05 2024 08:15 Antithesis wrote:
Attempting to declare Maru the all-time GoaT, while simultaneously conceding that Serral is superior in terms of head-to-head record, not only to him, but also to the rest of all other top-tier players to me is a contradiction in terms. Here is how WombaT put a similar view: Show nested quote +On February 06 2024 05:19 WombaT wrote:
For me the H2H bolstering his claim for Serral isn’t his over Maru, it’s him having a winning record against basically everyone, including Maru. Nobody is making the claim that Serral's individual record against Maru is of any particular relevance. Furthermore, a good – and in the case of Serral, the best – overall head-to-head record against all other top-tier players, in major or permier tournaments, over an extended period of time, evidently equates to good results in terms of most other metrics discussed here, like tournament wins and consistency. Which, too, is reflected in Serral's factual results. Up to this point, nothing about this is really controversial. Now, of course, it's perfectly fine to argue that achievements stretched over a longer period of time and across more formats, as accomplished by Maru, are more impressive than a higher and more consistent level of dominance over a shorter period of time. Personally, I do not agree with this, but it's a perfectly reasonable position. But it's simply disingenuous to pretend that anyone is making the case for Serral on the grounds of his individual record against Maru.
The whole point about about individual record and/or head-to-head is that you only need to lose once and its over. And not all the matches/tournaments are created equally in term of legacy/GOAT consideration. Serral will look very impressive in the course of the year and winning 2-3 tournaments, but he might just have a bad day in ZvZ or facing Clem, ect. and he would be out of the biggest tournament in the year. Does that enhance his GOAT case over someone like Rogue, who lost out earlier in lots of tournament, but show up and win on the biggest stage?
Serral would beat Zest/Ragnarok/Solar 90% of the time they meet, but he got eliminated by them in the biggest tournament of the year, so does that help or hurt his legacy?
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On February 06 2024 04:29 Mizenhauer wrote:Show nested quote +On February 06 2024 04:24 Poopi wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:41 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:38 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:33 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:31 Nakajin wrote:On February 05 2024 20:46 Charoisaur wrote:
As I already said in another thread, using Serral's head to head record against Maru as proof he's the better player is imo very disingenous as Maru had already 7-8 years of his career behind him when Serral became relevant. After 8 years of fulltime-competition it's much more likely to burn out and become less motivated and Maru also had to deal with injuries etc, whereas Serral was able to spend all his peak years in the post-2017 era. Becoming less motivated is a pretty silly argument to use. We're discusing a GOAT list, being motivated is a pretty freaking important element. He just has to stay motivated if he want to be the best. That's like saying Soulkey is better than Rogue but he just got tired of SC2. "Just stay more motivated" Federer has a pretty terrible record against Djokovic in the last 5 years, I guess he's out of the Goat conversation Federer is a good few years older than Djokovic, and latterly had some pretty consistent injury issues in a very physical sport. But the results are there and Federer did poorly. The rest is just imagination Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately. Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol? Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list? Winnings/2018 almost all zergs over performed 2018 wasn’t the worst offender, it was around the same as late 2017 & hydra buff in terms of Zerg being strong, 2019 was the worst, then it kinda maintained around 2017-2018 level the following years Maru was the only Terran getting any success in 2018 though, it’s quite clear looking at the winnings Hasn't any one noticed that there has been a maximum of 3 (and often 2) really good zergs in Korea for over a decade now? It's been some combination of Dark/soO/Rogue/ByuL/Soulkey/Solar(?) since like 2013. 2017 was the rare yeas with three good zerg, but in 2018 soO drops off, Solar drops off and you end up with Dark and Rogue as the two good zergs that year. I think balance matters less than ever. Terran has two legitimate champion contenders in Maru and Clem. Zerg has Dark, Solar, Serral, Reynor. Protoss has two military returnees who, other than that really nice herO stretch, look like military returnees. Balance has an effect, but I'm gonna go with the infinite time gsl winner and clem or a bunch of zergs with like 6 or 7 combined WC's over the two Protoss who look extremely rusty at times.
I know we don't talk about that one player, but there was that one zerg player who was really good for 2012-2015.......
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Northern Ireland25030 Posts
On February 06 2024 16:00 Blargh wrote:Show nested quote +On February 06 2024 04:29 Mizenhauer wrote:On February 06 2024 04:24 Poopi wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:41 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:38 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:33 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:31 Nakajin wrote:
[quote]
Becoming less motivated is a pretty silly argument to use. We're discusing a GOAT list, being motivated is a pretty freaking important element. He just has to stay motivated if he want to be the best.
That's like saying Soulkey is better than Rogue but he just got tired of SC2. "Just stay more motivated" Federer has a pretty terrible record against Djokovic in the last 5 years, I guess he's out of the Goat conversation Federer is a good few years older than Djokovic, and latterly had some pretty consistent injury issues in a very physical sport. But the results are there and Federer did poorly. The rest is just imagination Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately. Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol? Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list? Winnings/2018 almost all zergs over performed 2018 wasn’t the worst offender, it was around the same as late 2017 & hydra buff in terms of Zerg being strong, 2019 was the worst, then it kinda maintained around 2017-2018 level the following years Maru was the only Terran getting any success in 2018 though, it’s quite clear looking at the winnings Hasn't any one noticed that there has been a maximum of 3 (and often 2) really good zergs in Korea for over a decade now? It's been some combination of Dark/soO/Rogue/ByuL/Soulkey/Solar(?) since like 2013. 2017 was the rare yeas with three good zerg, but in 2018 soO drops off, Solar drops off and you end up with Dark and Rogue as the two good zergs that year. I think balance matters less than ever. Terran has two legitimate champion contenders in Maru and Clem. Zerg has Dark, Solar, Serral, Reynor. Protoss has two military returnees who, other than that really nice herO stretch, look like military returnees. Balance has an effect, but I'm gonna go with the infinite time gsl winner and clem or a bunch of zergs with like 6 or 7 combined WC's over the two Protoss who look extremely rusty at times. I know we don't talk about that one player, but there was that one zerg player who was really good for 2012-2015.......
Man it’s been so long I forgot that Taeja played Zerg
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On February 06 2024 18:36 WombaT wrote:Show nested quote +On February 06 2024 16:00 Blargh wrote:On February 06 2024 04:29 Mizenhauer wrote:On February 06 2024 04:24 Poopi wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:41 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:38 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:33 Charoisaur wrote:
[quote]
"Just stay more motivated"
Federer has a pretty terrible record against Djokovic in the last 5 years, I guess he's out of the Goat conversation Federer is a good few years older than Djokovic, and latterly had some pretty consistent injury issues in a very physical sport. But the results are there and Federer did poorly. The rest is just imagination Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately. Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol? Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list? Winnings/2018 almost all zergs over performed 2018 wasn’t the worst offender, it was around the same as late 2017 & hydra buff in terms of Zerg being strong, 2019 was the worst, then it kinda maintained around 2017-2018 level the following years Maru was the only Terran getting any success in 2018 though, it’s quite clear looking at the winnings Hasn't any one noticed that there has been a maximum of 3 (and often 2) really good zergs in Korea for over a decade now? It's been some combination of Dark/soO/Rogue/ByuL/Soulkey/Solar(?) since like 2013. 2017 was the rare yeas with three good zerg, but in 2018 soO drops off, Solar drops off and you end up with Dark and Rogue as the two good zergs that year. I think balance matters less than ever. Terran has two legitimate champion contenders in Maru and Clem. Zerg has Dark, Solar, Serral, Reynor. Protoss has two military returnees who, other than that really nice herO stretch, look like military returnees. Balance has an effect, but I'm gonna go with the infinite time gsl winner and clem or a bunch of zergs with like 6 or 7 combined WC's over the two Protoss who look extremely rusty at times. I know we don't talk about that one player, but there was that one zerg player who was really good for 2012-2015....... Man it’s been so long I forgot that Taeja played Zerg
He said good
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France12789 Posts
I miss Zest, I hope that once he finishes military there is still a somewhat healthy scene and he is motivated enough to try and come back
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On February 05 2024 01:09 Fango wrote:Show nested quote +On February 04 2024 23:44 ejozl wrote:On January 28 2024 19:08 SharkStarcraft wrote:
I feel like leaving out Dark completely out of the top 10 ist not happening at this point, same for inno, and the other spots are locked for obvious reasons. but seriously - how can rain then make the top 10 and mvp doesn't?? they both had comparatively short peaks but MVPs resume and legacy is so much more impressive... also wasn't there a list similar to this like 10 years ago that also had rain at #10 and mvp at #1?? and now the latter is not present at all? hmmmmm maybe we're all in for a surprise after all hehe
great writeup once again! love reading these and following the discussions about who should be where and so on. Because this list is more: "the greatest HotS players list", or "proleague players who also had a few other noteworthy achievements list". But since these titles don't get the hype, it's not called that. In no world is: MVP>Rain>MC, so the list is a bit nonsense and Serral will not be no. 1, because he wasn't part of proleague, so in a way he's not in the competition, he'll just on the list so that it doesn't get discredited. You say that only half way through the list. Serral, INno, Maru, TY, Rogue, and Dark (if he's there) all had their best results in LotV, and even Zest was 50/50. Over half the list is going to end up with LotV players. Also, Proleague was the lifeblood of korean sc2 competition for years, of course most of the top 10 would have played in it. Other than Serral, how many players with top 10 resumes didn't play in proleague? And Mvp>Rain>MC is completely correct, I don't see how anyone could argue otherwise to be honest.
I was being facetious. My point is that HotS and proleague is skewed too heavily. So even though Maru's achievements prior to LotV wasn't very impressive, because of this skew, his HotS achievements will somehow get blown up to signify that that makes him better than Serral, or whatever.
If you value WoL and thereby put MVP>Rain, then MC would also need to be above Rain, because MC is not that far behind MVP as the WoL GOAT. If you value WoL and LotV, then Classic, PartinG, herO, Trap, MC and Stats are all Protoss that should be knocking on Rain's door. And you can even argue Neeb.. And yes I agree that TaeJa sits with MC in ranking, possibly higher if you value wins 2x>losing in the finals.
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Northern Ireland25030 Posts
On February 06 2024 18:53 Durnuu wrote:Show nested quote +On February 06 2024 18:36 WombaT wrote:On February 06 2024 16:00 Blargh wrote:On February 06 2024 04:29 Mizenhauer wrote:On February 06 2024 04:24 Poopi wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:41 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:38 WombaT wrote:
[quote]
Federer is a good few years older than Djokovic, and latterly had some pretty consistent injury issues in a very physical sport. But the results are there and Federer did poorly. The rest is just imagination Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately. Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol? Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list? Winnings/2018 almost all zergs over performed 2018 wasn’t the worst offender, it was around the same as late 2017 & hydra buff in terms of Zerg being strong, 2019 was the worst, then it kinda maintained around 2017-2018 level the following years Maru was the only Terran getting any success in 2018 though, it’s quite clear looking at the winnings Hasn't any one noticed that there has been a maximum of 3 (and often 2) really good zergs in Korea for over a decade now? It's been some combination of Dark/soO/Rogue/ByuL/Soulkey/Solar(?) since like 2013. 2017 was the rare yeas with three good zerg, but in 2018 soO drops off, Solar drops off and you end up with Dark and Rogue as the two good zergs that year. I think balance matters less than ever. Terran has two legitimate champion contenders in Maru and Clem. Zerg has Dark, Solar, Serral, Reynor. Protoss has two military returnees who, other than that really nice herO stretch, look like military returnees. Balance has an effect, but I'm gonna go with the infinite time gsl winner and clem or a bunch of zergs with like 6 or 7 combined WC's over the two Protoss who look extremely rusty at times. I know we don't talk about that one player, but there was that one zerg player who was really good for 2012-2015....... Man it’s been so long I forgot that Taeja played Zerg He said good
Booooo. I don’t think he has a claim for top 10, but he’s probably a lock for somewhere in the top 20 which isn’t bad!
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On February 06 2024 07:13 Charoisaur wrote:Show nested quote +On February 06 2024 06:35 Balnazza wrote:On February 06 2024 03:32 Charoisaur wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:41 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:38 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:33 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:31 Nakajin wrote:
[quote]
Becoming less motivated is a pretty silly argument to use. We're discusing a GOAT list, being motivated is a pretty freaking important element. He just has to stay motivated if he want to be the best.
That's like saying Soulkey is better than Rogue but he just got tired of SC2. "Just stay more motivated" Federer has a pretty terrible record against Djokovic in the last 5 years, I guess he's out of the Goat conversation Federer is a good few years older than Djokovic, and latterly had some pretty consistent injury issues in a very physical sport. But the results are there and Federer did poorly. The rest is just imagination Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately. Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol?Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list? Not sure how that's related in any way to my point? My point is that Mbappe outperforming Messi during the time they both played at PSG doesn't mean he's the all time greater player My dude, in their mid-twenties most (E)Sports-athletes reach their prime, not fall off. And it is not like other players aren't playing this game for 12 years straight either. There is just not an excuse for a claimed GOAT to "lose motivation" at this stage and time... On February 06 2024 04:24 Poopi wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:41 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:38 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:33 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:31 Nakajin wrote:
[quote]
Becoming less motivated is a pretty silly argument to use. We're discusing a GOAT list, being motivated is a pretty freaking important element. He just has to stay motivated if he want to be the best.
That's like saying Soulkey is better than Rogue but he just got tired of SC2. "Just stay more motivated" Federer has a pretty terrible record against Djokovic in the last 5 years, I guess he's out of the Goat conversation Federer is a good few years older than Djokovic, and latterly had some pretty consistent injury issues in a very physical sport. But the results are there and Federer did poorly. The rest is just imagination Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately. Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol? Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list? Winnings/2018 almost all zergs over performed 2018 wasn’t the worst offender, it was around the same as late 2017 & hydra buff in terms of Zerg being strong, 2019 was the worst, then it kinda maintained around 2017-2018 level the following years Maru was the only Terran getting any success in 2018 though, it’s quite clear looking at the winnings If you look at the winnings by Top 10, I don't feel Zerg stands particularly out? Sure, by a larger margin Zerg earned the most (I mean...zerg also one two out of the biggest events). But by the 5th place Terran and Zerg are already equal again. Considering the persistent you have to point out how balance affected Serrals rise SO much, I would have expected something like "the 10th best Zerg wins as much as the 2nd best Terran". Not a maybe slightly misaligned, but overall completly normal spread ._. Holding against Maru that he didn't stay 100% motivated for 14 years so we could see his best version vs Serral's best version is pretty disingenous I think considering Serral hasn't done that either/didn't need to do that due to his shorter career. Do you really think keeping your 100% drive & competitive spirit for 6 years is as hard as it is to do that for 14 years? If in 8 years Serral is still just as dominant as he is now, then you can hold it against Maru that he didn't keep his 100% motivation for 14 years - not now.
Maru and Serral have almsot the same age. Maru won 2 premiers prior to Serral's rise. Which in the overall view isnt much (not at the #1 GOAT dispute, at least). People are trying to balance Maru's earlier wins as if they had been "best of the world" level achievement, which they were not.
I do think that those early achievements by Maru do count for GOAT dispute, but with the weight they had at that time. How many premier were disputed at the time a year?
If you look at Maru's results page, you wont see a lot of golden squares before 2018; In the stretch of 2013-2014, there quite a few top 4's, and also in 2017, which is when Maru's golden age starts and hits its peak in 2018.
Its hard to weight Maru's accomplishments vs Serral's. Maru's top tier longevity is indeed something very admirable. Just like Serral's dominance from 2018 on (It's been 6 years beeing the best SCII player! - with a hot Maru onboard). In premier tourneys both Maru and Serral participated together from WESG 2017 forward (which Maru won), Serral doubled top 4 finish counts of Maru.
Its a hard balance to execute. But i go with Serral. Never seen anyone playing so solidly for so long in almost every premier tournament.
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On February 06 2024 20:02 WombaT wrote:Show nested quote +On February 06 2024 18:53 Durnuu wrote:On February 06 2024 18:36 WombaT wrote:On February 06 2024 16:00 Blargh wrote:On February 06 2024 04:29 Mizenhauer wrote:On February 06 2024 04:24 Poopi wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:41 Charoisaur wrote:
[quote]
But the results are there and Federer did poorly. The rest is just imagination
Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately. Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol? Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list? Winnings/2018 almost all zergs over performed 2018 wasn’t the worst offender, it was around the same as late 2017 & hydra buff in terms of Zerg being strong, 2019 was the worst, then it kinda maintained around 2017-2018 level the following years Maru was the only Terran getting any success in 2018 though, it’s quite clear looking at the winnings Hasn't any one noticed that there has been a maximum of 3 (and often 2) really good zergs in Korea for over a decade now? It's been some combination of Dark/soO/Rogue/ByuL/Soulkey/Solar(?) since like 2013. 2017 was the rare yeas with three good zerg, but in 2018 soO drops off, Solar drops off and you end up with Dark and Rogue as the two good zergs that year. I think balance matters less than ever. Terran has two legitimate champion contenders in Maru and Clem. Zerg has Dark, Solar, Serral, Reynor. Protoss has two military returnees who, other than that really nice herO stretch, look like military returnees. Balance has an effect, but I'm gonna go with the infinite time gsl winner and clem or a bunch of zergs with like 6 or 7 combined WC's over the two Protoss who look extremely rusty at times. I know we don't talk about that one player, but there was that one zerg player who was really good for 2012-2015....... Man it’s been so long I forgot that Taeja played Zerg He said good Booooo. I don’t think he has a claim for top 10, but he’s probably a lock for somewhere in the top 20 which isn’t bad!
I'd put him right next to duckdeok
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On February 06 2024 20:34 Locutos wrote:Show nested quote +On February 06 2024 07:13 Charoisaur wrote:On February 06 2024 06:35 Balnazza wrote:On February 06 2024 03:32 Charoisaur wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:41 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:38 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:33 Charoisaur wrote:
[quote]
"Just stay more motivated"
Federer has a pretty terrible record against Djokovic in the last 5 years, I guess he's out of the Goat conversation Federer is a good few years older than Djokovic, and latterly had some pretty consistent injury issues in a very physical sport. But the results are there and Federer did poorly. The rest is just imagination Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately. Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol?Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list? Not sure how that's related in any way to my point? My point is that Mbappe outperforming Messi during the time they both played at PSG doesn't mean he's the all time greater player My dude, in their mid-twenties most (E)Sports-athletes reach their prime, not fall off. And it is not like other players aren't playing this game for 12 years straight either. There is just not an excuse for a claimed GOAT to "lose motivation" at this stage and time... On February 06 2024 04:24 Poopi wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:41 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:38 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:33 Charoisaur wrote:
[quote]
"Just stay more motivated"
Federer has a pretty terrible record against Djokovic in the last 5 years, I guess he's out of the Goat conversation Federer is a good few years older than Djokovic, and latterly had some pretty consistent injury issues in a very physical sport. But the results are there and Federer did poorly. The rest is just imagination Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately. Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol? Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list? Winnings/2018 almost all zergs over performed 2018 wasn’t the worst offender, it was around the same as late 2017 & hydra buff in terms of Zerg being strong, 2019 was the worst, then it kinda maintained around 2017-2018 level the following years Maru was the only Terran getting any success in 2018 though, it’s quite clear looking at the winnings If you look at the winnings by Top 10, I don't feel Zerg stands particularly out? Sure, by a larger margin Zerg earned the most (I mean...zerg also one two out of the biggest events). But by the 5th place Terran and Zerg are already equal again. Considering the persistent you have to point out how balance affected Serrals rise SO much, I would have expected something like "the 10th best Zerg wins as much as the 2nd best Terran". Not a maybe slightly misaligned, but overall completly normal spread ._. Holding against Maru that he didn't stay 100% motivated for 14 years so we could see his best version vs Serral's best version is pretty disingenous I think considering Serral hasn't done that either/didn't need to do that due to his shorter career. Do you really think keeping your 100% drive & competitive spirit for 6 years is as hard as it is to do that for 14 years? If in 8 years Serral is still just as dominant as he is now, then you can hold it against Maru that he didn't keep his 100% motivation for 14 years - not now. Maru and Serral have almsot the same age. Maru won 2 premiers prior to Serral's rise. Which in the overall view isnt much (not at the #1 GOAT dispute, at least). People are trying to balance Maru's earlier wins as if they had been "best of the world" level achievement, which they were not. I do think that those early achievements by Maru do count for GOAT dispute, but with the weight they had at that time. How many premier were disputed at the time a year? If you look at Maru's results page, you wont see a lot of golden squares before 2018; In the stretch of 2013-2014, there quite a few top 4's, and also in 2017, which is when Maru's golden age starts and hits its peak in 2018. Its hard to weight Maru's accomplishments vs Serral's. Maru's top tier longevity is indeed something very admirable. Just like Serral's dominance from 2018 on (It's been 6 years beeing the best SCII player! - with a hot Maru onboard). In premier tourneys both Maru and Serral participated together from WESG 2017 forward (which Maru won), Serral doubled top 4 finish counts of Maru. Its a hard balance to execute. But i go with Serral. Never seen anyone playing so solidly for so long in almost every premier tournament.
Serral hasn't been the top player since 2018 straight and I really wish people would either back it up or stop making that argument. Serral wasn't the best zerg in 2019, 2020, or 2021 (the best zerg player in those years were either reynor, dark, or rogue)
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France12789 Posts
On February 06 2024 20:44 lokol4890 wrote:Show nested quote +On February 06 2024 20:34 Locutos wrote:On February 06 2024 07:13 Charoisaur wrote:On February 06 2024 06:35 Balnazza wrote:On February 06 2024 03:32 Charoisaur wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:41 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:38 WombaT wrote:
[quote]
Federer is a good few years older than Djokovic, and latterly had some pretty consistent injury issues in a very physical sport. But the results are there and Federer did poorly. The rest is just imagination Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately. Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol?Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list? Not sure how that's related in any way to my point? My point is that Mbappe outperforming Messi during the time they both played at PSG doesn't mean he's the all time greater player My dude, in their mid-twenties most (E)Sports-athletes reach their prime, not fall off. And it is not like other players aren't playing this game for 12 years straight either. There is just not an excuse for a claimed GOAT to "lose motivation" at this stage and time... On February 06 2024 04:24 Poopi wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:41 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:38 WombaT wrote:
[quote]
Federer is a good few years older than Djokovic, and latterly had some pretty consistent injury issues in a very physical sport. But the results are there and Federer did poorly. The rest is just imagination Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately. Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol? Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list? Winnings/2018 almost all zergs over performed 2018 wasn’t the worst offender, it was around the same as late 2017 & hydra buff in terms of Zerg being strong, 2019 was the worst, then it kinda maintained around 2017-2018 level the following years Maru was the only Terran getting any success in 2018 though, it’s quite clear looking at the winnings If you look at the winnings by Top 10, I don't feel Zerg stands particularly out? Sure, by a larger margin Zerg earned the most (I mean...zerg also one two out of the biggest events). But by the 5th place Terran and Zerg are already equal again. Considering the persistent you have to point out how balance affected Serrals rise SO much, I would have expected something like "the 10th best Zerg wins as much as the 2nd best Terran". Not a maybe slightly misaligned, but overall completly normal spread ._. Holding against Maru that he didn't stay 100% motivated for 14 years so we could see his best version vs Serral's best version is pretty disingenous I think considering Serral hasn't done that either/didn't need to do that due to his shorter career. Do you really think keeping your 100% drive & competitive spirit for 6 years is as hard as it is to do that for 14 years? If in 8 years Serral is still just as dominant as he is now, then you can hold it against Maru that he didn't keep his 100% motivation for 14 years - not now. Maru and Serral have almsot the same age. Maru won 2 premiers prior to Serral's rise. Which in the overall view isnt much (not at the #1 GOAT dispute, at least). People are trying to balance Maru's earlier wins as if they had been "best of the world" level achievement, which they were not. I do think that those early achievements by Maru do count for GOAT dispute, but with the weight they had at that time. How many premier were disputed at the time a year? If you look at Maru's results page, you wont see a lot of golden squares before 2018; In the stretch of 2013-2014, there quite a few top 4's, and also in 2017, which is when Maru's golden age starts and hits its peak in 2018. Its hard to weight Maru's accomplishments vs Serral's. Maru's top tier longevity is indeed something very admirable. Just like Serral's dominance from 2018 on (It's been 6 years beeing the best SCII player! - with a hot Maru onboard). In premier tourneys both Maru and Serral participated together from WESG 2017 forward (which Maru won), Serral doubled top 4 finish counts of Maru. Its a hard balance to execute. But i go with Serral. Never seen anyone playing so solidly for so long in almost every premier tournament. Serral hasn't been the top player since 2018 straight and I really wish people would either back it up or stop making that argument. Serral wasn't the best zerg in 2019, 2020, or 2021 (the best zerg player in those years were either reynor, dark, or rogue)
Serral was a huge favorite these years, but didn't manage to win / live up to the insane expectations ; which is also the case for Maru.
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On February 06 2024 11:57 Charoisaur wrote:Show nested quote +On February 06 2024 10:05 WombaT wrote:On February 06 2024 08:42 Charoisaur wrote:On February 06 2024 08:11 Balnazza wrote:On February 06 2024 07:13 Charoisaur wrote:On February 06 2024 06:35 Balnazza wrote:On February 06 2024 03:32 Charoisaur wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:
[quote]
Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately.
Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol?Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list? Not sure how that's related in any way to my point? My point is that Mbappe outperforming Messi during the time they both played at PSG doesn't mean he's the all time greater player My dude, in their mid-twenties most (E)Sports-athletes reach their prime, not fall off. And it is not like other players aren't playing this game for 12 years straight either. There is just not an excuse for a claimed GOAT to "lose motivation" at this stage and time... On February 06 2024 04:24 Poopi wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:
[quote]
Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately.
Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol? Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list? Winnings/2018 almost all zergs over performed 2018 wasn’t the worst offender, it was around the same as late 2017 & hydra buff in terms of Zerg being strong, 2019 was the worst, then it kinda maintained around 2017-2018 level the following years Maru was the only Terran getting any success in 2018 though, it’s quite clear looking at the winnings If you look at the winnings by Top 10, I don't feel Zerg stands particularly out? Sure, by a larger margin Zerg earned the most (I mean...zerg also one two out of the biggest events). But by the 5th place Terran and Zerg are already equal again. Considering the persistent you have to point out how balance affected Serrals rise SO much, I would have expected something like "the 10th best Zerg wins as much as the 2nd best Terran". Not a maybe slightly misaligned, but overall completly normal spread ._. Holding against Maru that he didn't stay 100% motivated for 14 years so we could see his best version vs Serral's best version is pretty disingenous I think considering Serral hasn't done that either/didn't need to do that due to his shorter career. Do you really think keeping your 100% drive & competitive spirit for 6 years is as hard as it is to do that for 14 years? If in 8 years Serral is still just as dominant as he is now, then you can hold it against Maru that he didn't keep his 100% motivation for 14 years - not now. Of course it is hard and an achievement in itself to stay relevant for so long - but it is also easier to do that when you start so young, especially considering that Maru didn't have to deal with military service (yet). But it works in both ways: You can't hold it against Serral to have started out "late", especially when the reasons for it are mostly out of his hand anyway. These "What If"-scenarios can get out of hand pretty quickly, so I don't think that is in any shape or form helpful. You are basically replacing a non-helpful H2H with a theoretical H2H that doesn't work out either. What my point against Maru here is, is that even in his prime he wasn't "the one". Maru ramped up his trophy-cabinet in the same time-span as Serral, but didn't do is as well as him. If Maru "in his prime" (which I will just take from you and others, I personally don't agree with the whole idea) had won 3-5 GSLs I could see your point, but as I said before: You are basically saying just "being relevant, but never the best" for a long period of time is enough to qualify as the GOAT for you. It is a bit like the soO-case: Of course it is impressive how consistent he reached those (GSL) finals, but wouldn't you say to be 'the best GSL player ever' you at one point have to win the thing, too? And not just be "up there" long enough? Sure I agree with you (although I think his 2013-15 results are more impressive than you give him credit for, due to how stacked that era is). My argument is not that Maru is definitely the Goat over Serral (I'd give him the edge but it's basically a toss up imo). My main disagreement is using the h2h from Maru vs Serral for anything conclusive, imo it's just not particularly relevant. Serral got lucky that the majority of his matches against Maru were during the timeframe where he had the edge. I’ll only concede the point if you also concede Maru was lucky to be placed to have a career spanning basically the entirety of pro SC2 :p Ofc that's also true Show nested quote +
I dont think Balnazza is underrating his 2013-2015, least from my read. More that he was ‘one of the best’ rather than ‘the guy’. He was always hanging around as a top player, placing consistently and his subsequent Proleague record attests to that but say, an Inno or Zest were blowing him out of the water in terms of winning things consistently in HoTS, then subsequently early LoTV.
Well blowing out of the water is hyperbolic, but you get my point.
*Edit* it’s not even that hyperbolic. 2013, 2015 and then 2018 with WESG, which got him up to 3 Premiers. Quite a while, although there’s a lot of consistent top 4 finishes there. Then the rest of his 12 remaining titles all come from 2018 onwards.
Whereas someone like herO picked up 5 between 2013 thru 2015, including a Starleague himself. Inno has 4 from that same period, with 2 Starleagues. Etc
Yeah I never said he was the best during that era. I just think being one of the best and achieving what he did during that era is extremely impressive. Back then if you had a bad day in the ro32 you got eliminated right then and there, whereas nowadays if you have a bad day you still probably make it into the ro8 and then just need to win three more series to win the trophy. It's hard to say exactly how much more a trophy from that era should count compared to one in todays era, but it definitely should count a lot more. Players like Rogue, Stats and TY played throughout that era without winning a single tournament! That's my problem with Balnazza saying he "only" won 2 Starleagues during that era, as if it was a negative point
Then for future clarification: When I say "he *ONLY* won 2 Starleagues" I see that through a "we are trying to find the best player this game has ever seen"-lense. If you would ask me if Maru is a damn good player even prior to 2018, I would definetly say "ofc he is, he won two damn starleagues!"
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Northern Ireland25030 Posts
On February 06 2024 21:47 Poopi wrote:Show nested quote +On February 06 2024 20:44 lokol4890 wrote:On February 06 2024 20:34 Locutos wrote:On February 06 2024 07:13 Charoisaur wrote:On February 06 2024 06:35 Balnazza wrote:On February 06 2024 03:32 Charoisaur wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:41 Charoisaur wrote:
[quote]
But the results are there and Federer did poorly. The rest is just imagination
Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately. Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol?Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list? Not sure how that's related in any way to my point? My point is that Mbappe outperforming Messi during the time they both played at PSG doesn't mean he's the all time greater player My dude, in their mid-twenties most (E)Sports-athletes reach their prime, not fall off. And it is not like other players aren't playing this game for 12 years straight either. There is just not an excuse for a claimed GOAT to "lose motivation" at this stage and time... On February 06 2024 04:24 Poopi wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:41 Charoisaur wrote:
[quote]
But the results are there and Federer did poorly. The rest is just imagination
Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately. Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol? Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list? Winnings/2018 almost all zergs over performed 2018 wasn’t the worst offender, it was around the same as late 2017 & hydra buff in terms of Zerg being strong, 2019 was the worst, then it kinda maintained around 2017-2018 level the following years Maru was the only Terran getting any success in 2018 though, it’s quite clear looking at the winnings If you look at the winnings by Top 10, I don't feel Zerg stands particularly out? Sure, by a larger margin Zerg earned the most (I mean...zerg also one two out of the biggest events). But by the 5th place Terran and Zerg are already equal again. Considering the persistent you have to point out how balance affected Serrals rise SO much, I would have expected something like "the 10th best Zerg wins as much as the 2nd best Terran". Not a maybe slightly misaligned, but overall completly normal spread ._. Holding against Maru that he didn't stay 100% motivated for 14 years so we could see his best version vs Serral's best version is pretty disingenous I think considering Serral hasn't done that either/didn't need to do that due to his shorter career. Do you really think keeping your 100% drive & competitive spirit for 6 years is as hard as it is to do that for 14 years? If in 8 years Serral is still just as dominant as he is now, then you can hold it against Maru that he didn't keep his 100% motivation for 14 years - not now. Maru and Serral have almsot the same age. Maru won 2 premiers prior to Serral's rise. Which in the overall view isnt much (not at the #1 GOAT dispute, at least). People are trying to balance Maru's earlier wins as if they had been "best of the world" level achievement, which they were not. I do think that those early achievements by Maru do count for GOAT dispute, but with the weight they had at that time. How many premier were disputed at the time a year? If you look at Maru's results page, you wont see a lot of golden squares before 2018; In the stretch of 2013-2014, there quite a few top 4's, and also in 2017, which is when Maru's golden age starts and hits its peak in 2018. Its hard to weight Maru's accomplishments vs Serral's. Maru's top tier longevity is indeed something very admirable. Just like Serral's dominance from 2018 on (It's been 6 years beeing the best SCII player! - with a hot Maru onboard). In premier tourneys both Maru and Serral participated together from WESG 2017 forward (which Maru won), Serral doubled top 4 finish counts of Maru. Its a hard balance to execute. But i go with Serral. Never seen anyone playing so solidly for so long in almost every premier tournament. Serral hasn't been the top player since 2018 straight and I really wish people would either back it up or stop making that argument. Serral wasn't the best zerg in 2019, 2020, or 2021 (the best zerg player in those years were either reynor, dark, or rogue) Serral was a huge favorite these years, but didn't manage to win / live up to the insane expectations ; which is also the case for Maru.
I’d argue he was still the best Zerg overall for that span, and for most individual years.
His last Katowice came in a year that otherwise was pretty comparable to every other.
Peaking for the big events is of course also important but I don’t think others doing so, or Serral not mean that overall he wasn’t generally the best Zerg
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On January 27 2024 09:14 Balnazza wrote:
I'm still not buying into the hype that Mvp is even on this list. Being dominant when the game was new is just not that big of a feat. Sorry for yet again making the side-step to WC3, but I don't feel like DayFly or Madfrog ever were seriously in a Top 10 discussion of all time, considering how fast they dropped out compared to...well, everyone else.
Zest being the best Protoss seems about right. Him not being Top 5 also seems right.
Zest on paper is definitely great. Though I would put MC over him in terms of influence, Rain over him in terms of defining styles, and SoS over him for clutch play. Still happy to see a fellow Toss on a top 10.
MVP's story, influence, injury, comebacks, nukes, and him just being a normal human being in an era of giants... I definitely think he deserves to be in the top 10, debatable for the top 4 (the 4 spots left).
Regardless of whatever came after, the age of MVP/MC/MMA/Nesta gave us an incredibly entertaining era. No Terran after ever, had their mouth open in such beautiful form when they were so intensely focused (Gumiho, looking at you), just, great times.
My personal take for the rest of top 4, after seen #6~10: Maru, Rogue, MVP, Dark.
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On February 06 2024 20:44 lokol4890 wrote:Show nested quote +On February 06 2024 20:34 Locutos wrote:On February 06 2024 07:13 Charoisaur wrote:On February 06 2024 06:35 Balnazza wrote:On February 06 2024 03:32 Charoisaur wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:41 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:38 WombaT wrote:
[quote]
Federer is a good few years older than Djokovic, and latterly had some pretty consistent injury issues in a very physical sport. But the results are there and Federer did poorly. The rest is just imagination Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately. Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol?Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list? Not sure how that's related in any way to my point? My point is that Mbappe outperforming Messi during the time they both played at PSG doesn't mean he's the all time greater player My dude, in their mid-twenties most (E)Sports-athletes reach their prime, not fall off. And it is not like other players aren't playing this game for 12 years straight either. There is just not an excuse for a claimed GOAT to "lose motivation" at this stage and time... On February 06 2024 04:24 Poopi wrote:On February 06 2024 03:19 Balnazza wrote:On February 05 2024 20:49 Poopi wrote:
On top of that, Serral rose to prominence when Zerg was the strongest race by far, if you are a top Zerg, it’s expected to have positive h2h records vs P/T players.
Since Serral wasn’t good enough to meet Maru in the earlier years, we couldn’t see how he fared in less favorable metas. On the other hand, Maru has been the last Terran / Terran savior / Terran hope many years already Serral won seven Premier titles in 2018 - one of them was a ZvZ (the fourth WCS win over Reynor). Out of 12 slots in the GSL Top 4 that year only two slots were occupied by Zerg (soO/Dark). No Zerg even made the GSL finals that year. You could equally make the case for that year that terran was broken and Maru won his three GSLs because of that. The only Zerg-performance that is a bit out of place that year was Scarlett winning a smaller IEM - with only two koreans present (sOs and Zest). If Zerg was so OP that year that it affected Serrals rise so much (and you claim this every thread, so it must be a very significant boost he got)...why did no other Zerg outperform? Why didn't RagnaroK win a GSL that year or atleast made Top 4? On February 05 2024 21:55 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:48 WombaT wrote:On February 05 2024 21:41 Charoisaur wrote:On February 05 2024 21:38 WombaT wrote:
[quote]
Federer is a good few years older than Djokovic, and latterly had some pretty consistent injury issues in a very physical sport. But the results are there and Federer did poorly. The rest is just imagination Federer was approaching his 40s in a physically demanding sport. There’s only so much you can stretch the body to do ultimately. Maru and Serral are very close in age, in a much less physically demanding endeavour. It’s a stretch to compare Federer’s H2Hs slipping in his golden years to that dynamic. Hell that Federer was even running into Djokovic in tournaments at an age well beyond most pros had long, long retired is a testament to how good he was. Well, maybe it's even more obvious than the Maru-Serral case, but I don't think anyone can disagree that the circumstances of Maru and Serral facing each other, favored Serral, even if it's by a slight degree This is honestly a weird approach. So what, you can't make a Football GOAT-list because Pele didn't play in the last World Cup? And how can anyone claim Messi is the GOAT when he didn't even play in the 1958 World Cup? What's his excuse, being born 40 years later lol? Normally I would agree that the H2H isn't particularly helpful. But people claim that Serrals edge over Maru right now doesn't count because "Maru was in his prime earlier"...but even in his prime Maru wasn't the best. So why is he suddenly top of the list? Winnings/2018 almost all zergs over performed 2018 wasn’t the worst offender, it was around the same as late 2017 & hydra buff in terms of Zerg being strong, 2019 was the worst, then it kinda maintained around 2017-2018 level the following years Maru was the only Terran getting any success in 2018 though, it’s quite clear looking at the winnings If you look at the winnings by Top 10, I don't feel Zerg stands particularly out? Sure, by a larger margin Zerg earned the most (I mean...zerg also one two out of the biggest events). But by the 5th place Terran and Zerg are already equal again. Considering the persistent you have to point out how balance affected Serrals rise SO much, I would have expected something like "the 10th best Zerg wins as much as the 2nd best Terran". Not a maybe slightly misaligned, but overall completly normal spread ._. Holding against Maru that he didn't stay 100% motivated for 14 years so we could see his best version vs Serral's best version is pretty disingenous I think considering Serral hasn't done that either/didn't need to do that due to his shorter career. Do you really think keeping your 100% drive & competitive spirit for 6 years is as hard as it is to do that for 14 years? If in 8 years Serral is still just as dominant as he is now, then you can hold it against Maru that he didn't keep his 100% motivation for 14 years - not now. Maru and Serral have almsot the same age. Maru won 2 premiers prior to Serral's rise. Which in the overall view isnt much (not at the #1 GOAT dispute, at least). People are trying to balance Maru's earlier wins as if they had been "best of the world" level achievement, which they were not. I do think that those early achievements by Maru do count for GOAT dispute, but with the weight they had at that time. How many premier were disputed at the time a year? If you look at Maru's results page, you wont see a lot of golden squares before 2018; In the stretch of 2013-2014, there quite a few top 4's, and also in 2017, which is when Maru's golden age starts and hits its peak in 2018. Its hard to weight Maru's accomplishments vs Serral's. Maru's top tier longevity is indeed something very admirable. Just like Serral's dominance from 2018 on (It's been 6 years beeing the best SCII player! - with a hot Maru onboard). In premier tourneys both Maru and Serral participated together from WESG 2017 forward (which Maru won), Serral doubled top 4 finish counts of Maru. Its a hard balance to execute. But i go with Serral. Never seen anyone playing so solidly for so long in almost every premier tournament. Serral hasn't been the top player since 2018 straight and I really wish people would either back it up or stop making that argument. Serral wasn't the best zerg in 2019, 2020, or 2021 (the best zerg player in those years were either reynor, dark, or rogue)
It's possible that he's been the best player overall for the period 2018–present (in the sense of having the most premier wins/high level placements when he doesn't win/overall win-rate per game, etc)—and also that there have been stretches within that very long period where someone else was number one for a tournament or a season or whatever. He doesn't need to have been "the top player since 2018 straight" for that to be the case, and I think that is true.
But I'm not even sure I'd agree with you on, for example, Reynor being better in 2019. On Aligulac Serral was better against Koreans (65–29 (69.15%) games, 23–7 (76.67%) matches) than Reynor (58–47 (55.24%) games, 19–12 (61.29%) in matches), better in the head to head (6–4 in multi game series, 29–17 in games), and better in winning at winning tournaments:
2019 WCS Winter Europe: Reynor wins, Serral runner-up (3-4)
IEM Season XIII - Katowice: Serral loses in quarterfinals 2-3 vs eventual winner soO; I don't see Reynor anywhere on the page except that apparently he in the 29th-36th tier for distribution of prize money)
World Electronic Sports Games 2018¹: Serral runner-up; Reynor out in Ro16
2019 WCS Spring: Serral wins defeats Reynor 3-0 in the semis)
2019 WCS Summer: Reynor wins, Serral runner-up (2-4)
Assembly Summer 2019: Serral loses in semis 2-3 to Stats; Reynor out last in group stage)
2019 WCS Fall: Serral wins, Reynor runner-up (1-4)
2019 GSL vs. the World: Serral wins, Reynor loses 0-3 to SpeCial in Ro16
2019 WCS Global Finals: Reynor runner-up (1-4 vs Dark), defeats Serral 3-2 in the semis)
HSCXX: Serral wins 3-2 and 2-1 in a Bo5 and bracket reset Bo3 over Reynor
¹ They really ought to have just named it for the year it was being held
I don't see how you look at the big picture for the year and not still have Serral over Reynor for 2019. If you compared Serral vs Dark or Rogue maybe they were better in 2020 or 2021; I don't know for sure what I think without double checking, and those comparisons are less straightforward because of the incongruity of events played. But maybe he actually was still better overall in those years.
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EPT
