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Northern Ireland25933 Posts
On October 23 2025 14:49 rwala wrote:Show nested quote +On October 22 2025 19:03 WombaT wrote:On October 22 2025 14:26 rwala wrote:On October 22 2025 06:09 TeamMamba wrote:
Thanks for another great interview
Always enjoy Rotterdam contents and agree with most of what he said in regards to sc2 stuff.
People really need to stop boosting and overrating the skills level during kespa 2015. Google the concept of absolute versus relative comparisons and apply it to your kespa 2015 comment and then see if you can understand what's going on here. It's a fairly simple concept applied regularly in other games and sports, but somehow confuses SC fans. Most chess play from past world champions--including Garry Kasparov, the GOAT--would be considered iffy (if not completely refuted) by modern standards. Relative to chess understandings of the time Kasparov's play was of course genius. In case that helps you understand better. Plenty make the argument that the Kespa era was better skill-wise though as well. Not merely that it was an era with more competitive depth. Unlike many other sports, the scene has completely changed about 4 times structurally, so comparing does get rather tricky. Equally we’re not talking massive spans of time either. It is rather confusing in ways sure. For me it’s Serral, partly because there isn’t really an outstanding counter-candidate from pre-Serral times. If there was a properly dominant, Flash-esque player in the Kespa era, that player probably is the GOAT. As is, that player doesn’t really exist. And Serral’s playing against the existing hall of famers, without training in full-time team houses and they can’t really keep up. I think Serral’s accomplishments go a little under the radar, as absurd as that sounds because the scene has gone on, and on. He smashed a seemingly unbreakable ceiling, basically as a solo player doing his thing. Years of decline, the scene having a mere handful of genuine contenders, and other foreigners lifting WCs is kind of the norm we’re accustomed to, but in a way it detracts from the greatness of what Serral was doing way back in 2018 because we’ve got accustomed to it. You're 100% right that SC2 is different than pretty much every other sport and game. I'm not aware of any other one besides perhaps baseball in which the consensus GOAT pick never competed in the most competitive leagues and tournaments in the most competitive era of the game. Certainly I'm not aware of GOATs from other sports and games that got easy quals verging on auto-entries into premier international tournaments and world championships while all other GOAT contenders were nerfed in this regard (I'm pretty sure every KR GOAT contender missed out on multiple such tournaments). I missed all Serral's games against Mvp and the other Kespa era hall of famers, can you link them? Jokes aside, I think your casually incorrect overstatement demonstrates some of the key analytical problems people are having here. In any event, I wasn't really trying to challenge the Serral = GOAT consensus/cult/etc. I am trying to challenge folks to see outside of their confirmation bias and understand how normal fans of other games and sports understand GOATs. I honestly think for many SC2 fans and pros this comes down to "best" = GOAT, and Serral is almost certainly the best so he's a good pick. I'm not sure it's helpful or adds much credibility to exaggerate and say ridiculous things like he beat every hall of famer while he was a student playing part-time.
I can’t think of an individual sport where the GOAT never won a World Championship equivalent.
I follow plenty of other sports, they don’t all mesh neatly, but there are commonalities at times sure.
It’s a matter of accepting both sides of a particular coin, people tend to often just look at one. A pit you’re jumping into yourself while ostensibly trying to educate others on bias.
I am happy to accept there was a decline in cutthroat competition and optimal training environments after the Kespa pull-out. The other side of that particular coin however is that Serral never had that environment to begin with. And there was still plenty of prize money to go around, it didn’t fall off a cliff immediately, so plenty of incentives for other pros. Yet with that equaliser, Serral was consistently very competitive.
GSL again, I think is a fair crit and I would have loved to have seen Serral give it a shot, it’s his only mountain left to climb. But the other side of that particular coin is that Serral wasn’t in the field, and he was basically perpetually a top 4-5 player in the world at absolute worst, and often the best at best. It goes both ways. If, for some reason like peak Roger Federer refused to play the French Open, it’s absolutely a mark against his GOAT claim, but equally whoever wins didn’t have to play peak Federer. Not the best example given Nadal is the greatest clay court player, but hey!
Going back to the teams thing and the post Kespa era, and something that is almost never mentioned. JAGW did not disband with the Kespa pull-out, indeed they kept going for years.
A span which happens to cover Maru’s GSL 4-peat and Rogue jumping from being a good solid pro to a prolific tournament contender. As well as Trap being the best Toss for a while, Cure doing Cure things and sOs doing his thing.
I think there’s a plausible argument that Maru and Rogue’s GOAT claims were boosted by Kespa’s collapse, more than anyone else’s including Serral. It made things more level, where Serral had similar practice environments to many Korean pros, but the JAGW crew had a bit of a structural advantage over both.
Was like in Serie A when Juventus got relegated and other teams crippled. My Inter boys were making hay in winning leagues but, not quite as satisfying.
I think you have a point re qualifying for every tournament being more difficult for Koreans, especially in such a cutthroat era. Equally this wouldn’t really be an argument in most regular sports I’m aware of and follow. Usain Bolt is the GOAT precisely because he beat stiff competition in a strong sprinting nation to even get to the Olympics, and then smashing the best of the rest. It’s a more binary sport where times are king sure, but if he’d failed to qualify for multiple Olympics he’d not be regarded as highly.
In a weaker, less competitive era Maru’s basically been a lock for every WC event anyway. He’s had as many shots as Serral has had, and more before Serral went Serral mode.
Serral for me is the GOAT simply because there isn’t another obvious outstanding candidate, and he’s probably the closest with his trophies and general numbers.
Voldemort did his thing. Mvp’s body broke down. Both Inno and Maru haven’t got a WC under their belts, Rain dipped early, and both Rogue and Dark have the big titles + Starleagues (that Serral doesn’t) but aren’t as crazily consistent
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Northern Ireland25933 Posts
On October 23 2025 20:49 dysenterymd wrote:Show nested quote +On October 23 2025 15:01 rwala wrote:On October 22 2025 20:03 dysenterymd wrote:
Kespa era was definitely the most competitive, but not the highest-skilled. Valuing Kespa achievements highly is valid, but the funny thing is that the other goat contenders who get talked about (Rogue and Maru) have most of their achievements post-Kespa (Maru was a very good Kespa era player, but was nowhere near the goat debate pre-2018.)
If you took Kespa >>> all very seriously, Inno would probably be the GOAT? But then what do his poor results post-2017 (with the exception of the WESG win) mean? Okay, Inno had motivation issues, but Serral/Rogue/Maru still cleaned house with many players who were better than them during Kespa.
MJ's few "good" seasons with the Wizards are an absolute non-factor re: his GOAT candidacy and you really should just extend that same logic to Inno whatever the reasons for his drop-off. You're right about Rogue but Maru was the best player in the world for many stints pre-2018. Maru had 2 starleague wins, a bunch of deep runs, and a great proleague career pre-2018. sOs, Inno, Life, and Zest had clearly better Kespa careers than Maru, while players like Classic/soO/Rain/Soulkey/herO were in around Maru's ballpark depending on how you value certain achievements (2nd places vs 1st places, proleague vs non starleague championships, etc.) I actually do think Maru being one of the top 10 most accomplished players of the most competitive era helps his case for goat significantly. I also think the community doesn't rate proleague success highly enough (I don't know the exact conversion factor, but players like Maru/Inno being so amazing in proleague has to be worth at least one starleague, right?) But it's still true that most of Maru's accomplishments are post Kespa.
I consider Proleague a useful tiebreaker for sure. But only a tiebreaker I don’t really consider it versus a non-Proleague individual.
It’s the most closed competition going, not only do you have to be in Korea, you have to be in a team participating.
It’s also a very different format
It’s a great competition don’t get me wrong, I just think it muddies waters a little, partly because outside GSL the scene has generally been focused on individual weekender gauntlets.
You might see some brilliant build, but whose idea was it?
Don’t get me wrong I think Proleague was fantastic, and I wish we’d had more team leagues, but the team thing does come into play.
If we’re talking individual GOATs, how does one factor in teams planning and workshopping things for a week in advance? It’s a tricky one.
Classic’s famous DT blink build to snipe Rogue, he’s talked about working on it in practice, that it generally failed in practice, but with the match on the line and struggling in more standard scenarios, his balls increased in size about 3x and he just went for it.
For me, in assessing individuals that’s some clutch, off-the-wall stuff Classic brought in an environment without an entourage, or much time to prep. It’s not complicated to credit Classic for that one.
With Proleague, it gets a bit trickier. Then you’re almost looking for sets where the plan went to complete shit and the player adjusted and prevailed. But that’s not always obvious from the outside
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I really want to stay out of the discussion, just to avoid repeating the same-old arguments in both directions, especially on a thread that isn't even really about the GOAT-topic...but I have to ask:
On October 23 2025 15:01 rwala wrote:
You're right about Rogue but Maru was the best player in the world for many stints pre-2018.
What year(s) pre-2018 would anyone consider Maru to be the best player in the world?
Even if you would do the ludicrous thing to proclaim him the best player after winning his two Premier events pre-2018...that would still just be two 'stints', which in my book hardly count as "many".
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Northern Ireland25933 Posts
Yeah it’s an interesting interview all-round, not just another chance to relitigate GOAT chat :p
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United States1895 Posts
On October 24 2025 03:32 WombaT wrote:
Yeah it’s an interesting interview all-round, not just another chance to relitigate GOAT chat :p
GOAT addendum 2026 on the way!
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Northern Ireland25933 Posts
On October 24 2025 21:07 Mizenhauer wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2025 03:32 WombaT wrote:
Yeah it’s an interesting interview all-round, not just another chance to relitigate GOAT chat :p GOAT addendum 2026 on the way!
For realsies?
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On October 23 2025 20:42 Captain Peabody wrote:Show nested quote +On October 23 2025 03:18 Waxangel wrote:On October 22 2025 23:17 ejozl wrote:
It's hard to judge a player's career time while still being in it. Mvp wasn't seen as the absolute goat during wol at all, only upon hots did ppl start looking back and seeing him as the king of wings, looking back life was the best during kespa time + wol, and sOs and inno went above in post kespa. Because serral is still dominating after so many years can either mean that perhaps he tru;y is the greatest, or perhaps the scene is just not what it once was. I think it would be a mistake to take for granted how much he started to dominate and so suddenly, but at the same time I get annoyed when ppl think sc2 is all about mechanics and use the execution of top 3 players today as evidence against the kespa regime, when the game is so much more than being able to max out as fast as possible against the ai, or some other benchmark of execution. Gonna heavily disagree with your recollection of Mvp here—IMO winning 2012 Season 2 sealed the deal for a lot of fans during the game's early history. He's not alone, I also was around all through WoL and I also am a bit confused by the "MVP is the untouchable GOAT of Wings" fervor that others seem to recall. But I think maybe the problem is just one of relative perspective. Back in 2012 I don't recall that people would have been talking about whether or not MVP was "the GOAT" or even the greatest player of all time with emphasis on the all time. SC2 was a new game, and we all assumed it would have a lot of history going forward, just like BW. People very much did discuss and argue (on both sides) over whether he was "a bonjwa," and I would say something approaching a consensus ultimately accepted that he was. But a bonjwa is not exactly the same thing as *the GOAT* imo. I agree that Life is the main retrospective loser in terms of people forgetting about how dominant and iconic he really was at his peak, and how long that peak was. But there are obvious reasons for that.
That's true and it was wrong of me to use the word goat, but he wasn't the favourite in that 2012 gsl at all and that has after the fact increased his goatiness since he was able to win when he was weaker and all that old man mvp narrative despite him being 21. Mc was hailed as the winningest player for his earnings which he held to 2016 or smth. But as best player, there were always new ones on the rise, mma, HerO, drg, parting and life, and then there were the kespa influx. I don't think mvp was the favourite for most of his wins.
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Northern Ireland25933 Posts
On October 25 2025 03:33 ejozl wrote:Show nested quote +On October 23 2025 20:42 Captain Peabody wrote:On October 23 2025 03:18 Waxangel wrote:On October 22 2025 23:17 ejozl wrote:
It's hard to judge a player's career time while still being in it. Mvp wasn't seen as the absolute goat during wol at all, only upon hots did ppl start looking back and seeing him as the king of wings, looking back life was the best during kespa time + wol, and sOs and inno went above in post kespa. Because serral is still dominating after so many years can either mean that perhaps he tru;y is the greatest, or perhaps the scene is just not what it once was. I think it would be a mistake to take for granted how much he started to dominate and so suddenly, but at the same time I get annoyed when ppl think sc2 is all about mechanics and use the execution of top 3 players today as evidence against the kespa regime, when the game is so much more than being able to max out as fast as possible against the ai, or some other benchmark of execution. Gonna heavily disagree with your recollection of Mvp here—IMO winning 2012 Season 2 sealed the deal for a lot of fans during the game's early history. He's not alone, I also was around all through WoL and I also am a bit confused by the "MVP is the untouchable GOAT of Wings" fervor that others seem to recall. But I think maybe the problem is just one of relative perspective. Back in 2012 I don't recall that people would have been talking about whether or not MVP was "the GOAT" or even the greatest player of all time with emphasis on the all time. SC2 was a new game, and we all assumed it would have a lot of history going forward, just like BW. People very much did discuss and argue (on both sides) over whether he was "a bonjwa," and I would say something approaching a consensus ultimately accepted that he was. But a bonjwa is not exactly the same thing as *the GOAT* imo. I agree that Life is the main retrospective loser in terms of people forgetting about how dominant and iconic he really was at his peak, and how long that peak was. But there are obvious reasons for that. That's true and it was wrong of me to use the word goat, but he wasn't the favourite in that 2012 gsl at all and that has after the fact increased his goatiness since he was able to win when he was weaker and all that old man mvp narrative despite him being 21. Mc was hailed as the winningest player for his earnings which he held to 2016 or smth. But as best player, there were always new ones on the rise, mma, HerO, drg, parting and life, and then there were the kespa influx. I don't think mvp was the favourite for most of his wins.
It was Mvp though the scene was so competitive he wasn’t as dominant as some of the modern guys. And the periods are much shorter then too, say 6 months versus several years.
He wasn’t on top the whole time, and Nestea was putting in similar accomplishments early doors, but dropped off a lot quicker. They were almost the ‘Big 2’ for a bit.
MC, MMA, DRG won big things they entered the conversation and were probably the world’s best at times. But perhaps they didn’t maintain it to surpass Mvp. Taeja did Taeja things, and I think he was incredible but he didn’t really win the big prestige prizes.
Parting I dunno why he always features in this convos but anyway :p
There was stiff competition, and it’s not as clear cut as say, Maru and Serral in post-Kespa, but I think on balance Mvp definitely deserved the King of Wings moniker.
For me the lineage of like an outright best player for any sizeable span , Voldemort and Inno took over after a bit, and then we have a pretty long period where you’ve got a handful of top players without one outstanding candidate. Then we’re into the ‘modern era’ which is like half the game’s life where you’ve had a few deviations but Serral and Maru probably stayed on top the longest
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On October 23 2025 20:49 dysenterymd wrote:Show nested quote +On October 23 2025 15:01 rwala wrote:On October 22 2025 20:03 dysenterymd wrote:
Kespa era was definitely the most competitive, but not the highest-skilled. Valuing Kespa achievements highly is valid, but the funny thing is that the other goat contenders who get talked about (Rogue and Maru) have most of their achievements post-Kespa (Maru was a very good Kespa era player, but was nowhere near the goat debate pre-2018.)
If you took Kespa >>> all very seriously, Inno would probably be the GOAT? But then what do his poor results post-2017 (with the exception of the WESG win) mean? Okay, Inno had motivation issues, but Serral/Rogue/Maru still cleaned house with many players who were better than them during Kespa.
MJ's few "good" seasons with the Wizards are an absolute non-factor re: his GOAT candidacy and you really should just extend that same logic to Inno whatever the reasons for his drop-off. You're right about Rogue but Maru was the best player in the world for many stints pre-2018. Maru had 2 starleague wins, a bunch of deep runs, and a great proleague career pre-2018. sOs, Inno, Life, and Zest had clearly better Kespa careers than Maru, while players like Classic/soO/Rain/Soulkey/herO were in around Maru's ballpark depending on how you value certain achievements (2nd places vs 1st places, proleague vs non starleague championships, etc.) I actually do think Maru being one of the top 10 most accomplished players of the most competitive era helps his case for goat significantly. I also think the community doesn't rate proleague success highly enough (I don't know the exact conversion factor, but players like Maru/Inno being so amazing in proleague has to be worth at least one starleague, right?) But it's still true that most of Maru's accomplishments are post Kespa.
Totally premo and wombat in other threads literally said proleague doesn’t matter at all and then started changing their tune when they realized how silly it sounded.
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On October 24 2025 02:56 Balnazza wrote:I really want to stay out of the discussion, just to avoid repeating the same-old arguments in both directions, especially on a thread that isn't even really about the GOAT-topic...but I have to ask: Show nested quote +On October 23 2025 15:01 rwala wrote:
You're right about Rogue but Maru was the best player in the world for many stints pre-2018.
What year(s) pre-2018 would anyone consider Maru to be the best player in the world? Even if you would do the ludicrous thing to proclaim him the best player after winning his two Premier events pre-2018...that would still just be two 'stints', which in my book hardly count as "many".
Most of 2016 Proleague when he accomplished one of the greatest feats in all of SC. But I’d be happy to concede he wasn’t the best player as much as Inno, Rain, Zest, TY, MVP, and probably others. You can go back and watch Proleague and that’s what Wolf, GTR, Valdez were saying. A lot of the modern fans don’t really remember or even value Proleague because they never watched it or cared much about it and would probably point out that Maru didn’t even make Blizzcon in 2016. Neither did Inno, and in fact many Korean GOATs failed to break through region lock since they unfortunately didn’t have the region lock near autoqualify that got players like Elazer and Special in.
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On October 23 2025 16:47 PremoBeats wrote:Show nested quote +On October 23 2025 14:49 rwala wrote:On October 22 2025 19:03 WombaT wrote:On October 22 2025 14:26 rwala wrote:On October 22 2025 06:09 TeamMamba wrote:
Thanks for another great interview
Always enjoy Rotterdam contents and agree with most of what he said in regards to sc2 stuff.
People really need to stop boosting and overrating the skills level during kespa 2015. Google the concept of absolute versus relative comparisons and apply it to your kespa 2015 comment and then see if you can understand what's going on here. It's a fairly simple concept applied regularly in other games and sports, but somehow confuses SC fans. Most chess play from past world champions--including Garry Kasparov, the GOAT--would be considered iffy (if not completely refuted) by modern standards. Relative to chess understandings of the time Kasparov's play was of course genius. In case that helps you understand better. Plenty make the argument that the Kespa era was better skill-wise though as well. Not merely that it was an era with more competitive depth. Unlike many other sports, the scene has completely changed about 4 times structurally, so comparing does get rather tricky. Equally we’re not talking massive spans of time either. It is rather confusing in ways sure. For me it’s Serral, partly because there isn’t really an outstanding counter-candidate from pre-Serral times. If there was a properly dominant, Flash-esque player in the Kespa era, that player probably is the GOAT. As is, that player doesn’t really exist. And Serral’s playing against the existing hall of famers, without training in full-time team houses and they can’t really keep up. I think Serral’s accomplishments go a little under the radar, as absurd as that sounds because the scene has gone on, and on. He smashed a seemingly unbreakable ceiling, basically as a solo player doing his thing. Years of decline, the scene having a mere handful of genuine contenders, and other foreigners lifting WCs is kind of the norm we’re accustomed to, but in a way it detracts from the greatness of what Serral was doing way back in 2018 because we’ve got accustomed to it. You're 100% right that SC2 is different than pretty much every other sport and game. I'm not aware of any other one besides perhaps baseball in which the consensus GOAT pick never competed in the most competitive leagues and tournaments in the most competitive era of the game. Certainly I'm not aware of GOATs from other sports and games that got easy quals verging on auto-entries into premier international tournaments and world championships while all other GOAT contenders were nerfed in this regard (I'm pretty sure every KR GOAT contender missed out on multiple such tournaments). I missed all Serral's games against Mvp and the other Kespa era hall of famers, can you link them? Jokes aside, I think your casually incorrect overstatement demonstrates some of the key analytical problems people are having here. In any event, I wasn't really trying to challenge the Serral = GOAT consensus/cult/etc. I am trying to challenge folks to see outside of their confirmation bias and understand how normal fans of other games and sports understand GOATs. I honestly think for many SC2 fans and pros this comes down to "best" = GOAT, and Serral is almost certainly the best so he's a good pick. I'm not sure it's helpful or adds much credibility to exaggerate and say ridiculous things like he beat every hall of famer while he was a student playing part-time. Trying to chip away at Serral on the basis that he was not born Korean (as the implication is him missing a "proper" GSL win in his resume) is a weak leg to stand on, as was pointed out several times. He on multiple occasions showed to be perfectly able to win competitively even in Korea and in tournaments with top Korean participation on the international stage when competition was insanely strong. As Rotti stated, Serral did so with numbers that no one else was/is able to match in the slightest. So you missed all of Serral's games against Mvp? Then you missed also all of Mvp's games against Serral, as the argument goes both ways. It would actually be quite ironic to pick Mvp to prove a point, as he has way less games than Serral against the greatest players of SC2. He played the same amounts of games against Rain as Serral (2). He only played twice against TY. Against herO, Life, sOs, soO as well as Inno he only played once. And Mvp never played Dark, Maru, Classic, Rogue, Zest, Trap, Stats, MaxPax or Reynor while Serral demolished all of the aforementioned multiple times over several years with insane match win rates (except Life, whom he never played and Rain and Rogue against whom the record is somehow even). This is what Rotti points out in the video: To claim that Serral only played outside of competitiveness is utterly absurd and has no basis in reality. He has a more than sufficient display against the Prime SC2 greats and against guys who were forged in that time and exploded later like Dark. As we had this discussion multiple times, you know my stance by now: If you disagree that Serral is the GOAT - that is fine, but please use factual takes to support your claims. Similar to your reply to WombaT, who didn't say that he "he beat every hall of famer while he was a student playing part-time". WombaT's words were "Serral’s playing against the existing hall of famers, without training in full-time team houses and they can’t really keep up". There is no absolute claim about "every" hall of famer involved and the hyperbolic exaggeration of Serral being a "student playing part-time" is also not present in the original text.
I don’t know who you’re arguing with since I don’t care what soil anyone is born on or plays on. It’s ironic that you’re doing what you accuse me of. But fair, I did overstate Wombat’s point. But he is fundamentally incorrect in his point. Serral simply did not compete with many hall of famers and—again—he did not compete in the most competitive tournaments and leagues. That’s just not a debatable proposition. It’s a mathematical reality. Proleague was the most competitive league. He did not play in it. KILs were the most competitive tournaments. He sis not play in them. He basically got auto entries into every premier tourney and world championship that many Korean GOAT contenders were excluded from. Not debatable. Serral can still be the GOAT, but the issue is folks like you bending over backwards to say that math equation can tell you objectively who is the GOAt…iit’s just kinda cringe to be honest. You end up saying weird things like Proleague doesn’t matter but Aligulac rating does.
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On October 25 2025 14:17 rwala wrote:Show nested quote +On October 23 2025 16:47 PremoBeats wrote:On October 23 2025 14:49 rwala wrote:On October 22 2025 19:03 WombaT wrote:On October 22 2025 14:26 rwala wrote:On October 22 2025 06:09 TeamMamba wrote:
Thanks for another great interview
Always enjoy Rotterdam contents and agree with most of what he said in regards to sc2 stuff.
People really need to stop boosting and overrating the skills level during kespa 2015. Google the concept of absolute versus relative comparisons and apply it to your kespa 2015 comment and then see if you can understand what's going on here. It's a fairly simple concept applied regularly in other games and sports, but somehow confuses SC fans. Most chess play from past world champions--including Garry Kasparov, the GOAT--would be considered iffy (if not completely refuted) by modern standards. Relative to chess understandings of the time Kasparov's play was of course genius. In case that helps you understand better. Plenty make the argument that the Kespa era was better skill-wise though as well. Not merely that it was an era with more competitive depth. Unlike many other sports, the scene has completely changed about 4 times structurally, so comparing does get rather tricky. Equally we’re not talking massive spans of time either. It is rather confusing in ways sure. For me it’s Serral, partly because there isn’t really an outstanding counter-candidate from pre-Serral times. If there was a properly dominant, Flash-esque player in the Kespa era, that player probably is the GOAT. As is, that player doesn’t really exist. And Serral’s playing against the existing hall of famers, without training in full-time team houses and they can’t really keep up. I think Serral’s accomplishments go a little under the radar, as absurd as that sounds because the scene has gone on, and on. He smashed a seemingly unbreakable ceiling, basically as a solo player doing his thing. Years of decline, the scene having a mere handful of genuine contenders, and other foreigners lifting WCs is kind of the norm we’re accustomed to, but in a way it detracts from the greatness of what Serral was doing way back in 2018 because we’ve got accustomed to it. You're 100% right that SC2 is different than pretty much every other sport and game. I'm not aware of any other one besides perhaps baseball in which the consensus GOAT pick never competed in the most competitive leagues and tournaments in the most competitive era of the game. Certainly I'm not aware of GOATs from other sports and games that got easy quals verging on auto-entries into premier international tournaments and world championships while all other GOAT contenders were nerfed in this regard (I'm pretty sure every KR GOAT contender missed out on multiple such tournaments). I missed all Serral's games against Mvp and the other Kespa era hall of famers, can you link them? Jokes aside, I think your casually incorrect overstatement demonstrates some of the key analytical problems people are having here. In any event, I wasn't really trying to challenge the Serral = GOAT consensus/cult/etc. I am trying to challenge folks to see outside of their confirmation bias and understand how normal fans of other games and sports understand GOATs. I honestly think for many SC2 fans and pros this comes down to "best" = GOAT, and Serral is almost certainly the best so he's a good pick. I'm not sure it's helpful or adds much credibility to exaggerate and say ridiculous things like he beat every hall of famer while he was a student playing part-time. Trying to chip away at Serral on the basis that he was not born Korean (as the implication is him missing a "proper" GSL win in his resume) is a weak leg to stand on, as was pointed out several times. He on multiple occasions showed to be perfectly able to win competitively even in Korea and in tournaments with top Korean participation on the international stage when competition was insanely strong. As Rotti stated, Serral did so with numbers that no one else was/is able to match in the slightest. So you missed all of Serral's games against Mvp? Then you missed also all of Mvp's games against Serral, as the argument goes both ways. It would actually be quite ironic to pick Mvp to prove a point, as he has way less games than Serral against the greatest players of SC2. He played the same amounts of games against Rain as Serral (2). He only played twice against TY. Against herO, Life, sOs, soO as well as Inno he only played once. And Mvp never played Dark, Maru, Classic, Rogue, Zest, Trap, Stats, MaxPax or Reynor while Serral demolished all of the aforementioned multiple times over several years with insane match win rates (except Life, whom he never played and Rain and Rogue against whom the record is somehow even). This is what Rotti points out in the video: To claim that Serral only played outside of competitiveness is utterly absurd and has no basis in reality. He has a more than sufficient display against the Prime SC2 greats and against guys who were forged in that time and exploded later like Dark. As we had this discussion multiple times, you know my stance by now: If you disagree that Serral is the GOAT - that is fine, but please use factual takes to support your claims. Similar to your reply to WombaT, who didn't say that he "he beat every hall of famer while he was a student playing part-time". WombaT's words were "Serral’s playing against the existing hall of famers, without training in full-time team houses and they can’t really keep up". There is no absolute claim about "every" hall of famer involved and the hyperbolic exaggeration of Serral being a "student playing part-time" is also not present in the original text. I don’t know who you’re arguing with since I don’t care what soil anyone is born on or plays on. It’s ironic that you’re doing what you accuse me of. But fair, I did overstate Wombat’s point. But he is fundamentally incorrect in his point. Serral simply did not compete with many hall of famers and—again—he did not compete in the most competitive tournaments and leagues. That’s just not a debatable proposition. It’s a mathematical reality. Proleague was the most competitive league. He did not play in it. KILs were the most competitive tournaments. He sis not play in them. He basically got auto entries into every premier tourney and world championship that many Korean GOAT contenders were excluded from. Not debatable. Serral can still be the GOAT, but the issue is folks like you bending over backwards to say that math equation can tell you objectively who is the GOAt…iit’s just kinda cringe to be honest. You end up saying weird things like Proleague doesn’t matter but Aligulac rating does.
Which Hall of Famers didn't Serral play against? Let's put some numbers on that claim.
And I am not bending over backwards, as I used plausible regression models.
Up until the weighting (which I concede for the 100th time, as you still try to make a point where none is to be made) - which was utterly pointless to begin with as Serral topped every category - my subjective decisions were based on player strengths in tournaments, regression models and the analysis of surrounding datapoints leading to these two.
I basically only had 2 debatable modifiers if we leave weighting out of the equation (era and tournament score) and showed that Serral only loses his first spot if you hyper-focus era. This would lead to him losing out in the end to Life. I never checked how much tweaking it would take for Maru to overtake him, but my gut feeling is, that if the rest of the setup is fairly and - most importantly - consistently measured, that Inno would overtake Maru, before Maru overtakes Serral, as it would take a lot of tweaking before Maru's achievements in the prime era outweigh what Serral has done in the time that they both were at the top. And that is basically my whole claim. I don't claim that Serral played in KILs and Proleague. My claim is that the players and the tournaments he played are clearing the threshhold to call him GOAT easily.
And in regards to the 2 debatable modifiers: even the suggestions of people criticizing my entire approach wouldn't have led to massively different results as we were only discussing tiny tweaks in the grand scheme of things.
On October 25 2025 13:46 rwala wrote:Show nested quote +On October 23 2025 20:49 dysenterymd wrote:On October 23 2025 15:01 rwala wrote:On October 22 2025 20:03 dysenterymd wrote:
Kespa era was definitely the most competitive, but not the highest-skilled. Valuing Kespa achievements highly is valid, but the funny thing is that the other goat contenders who get talked about (Rogue and Maru) have most of their achievements post-Kespa (Maru was a very good Kespa era player, but was nowhere near the goat debate pre-2018.)
If you took Kespa >>> all very seriously, Inno would probably be the GOAT? But then what do his poor results post-2017 (with the exception of the WESG win) mean? Okay, Inno had motivation issues, but Serral/Rogue/Maru still cleaned house with many players who were better than them during Kespa.
MJ's few "good" seasons with the Wizards are an absolute non-factor re: his GOAT candidacy and you really should just extend that same logic to Inno whatever the reasons for his drop-off. You're right about Rogue but Maru was the best player in the world for many stints pre-2018. Maru had 2 starleague wins, a bunch of deep runs, and a great proleague career pre-2018. sOs, Inno, Life, and Zest had clearly better Kespa careers than Maru, while players like Classic/soO/Rain/Soulkey/herO were in around Maru's ballpark depending on how you value certain achievements (2nd places vs 1st places, proleague vs non starleague championships, etc.) I actually do think Maru being one of the top 10 most accomplished players of the most competitive era helps his case for goat significantly. I also think the community doesn't rate proleague success highly enough (I don't know the exact conversion factor, but players like Maru/Inno being so amazing in proleague has to be worth at least one starleague, right?) But it's still true that most of Maru's accomplishments are post Kespa. Totally premo and wombat in other threads literally said proleague doesn’t matter at all and then started changing their tune when they realized how silly it sounded.
Please quote that. Because as far as I remember and as far as can be read upon in my first article, I discarded team results because of the inherent issues of adding them to individual results (being carried by a team, putting a burden on your team but still receicing points as the team performed well, how to measure contribution, how to handle the fact there there were only 8 teams versus 32 or 64 players which leads to fewer knockout stages, etc.), not because I thought that Proleague didn't matter. I established a whole new system to include team results (fairly imo) in the 2nd article. So again: Why the need to put words in my mouth or mischaracterize what happened?
I am also not aware of any quote WombaT made in that direction.
Here are my exact words from the first article.
+ Show Spoiler +
As you can see, I did not include team scores, as I see the GOAT discussion as an enterprise of an individual. A player could have been lifted up or put down by a team and including team scores would dilute the results heavily. But player’s accomplishments - such as Maru’s phenomenal Proleague run in 2016 (22-4) - will be included in the match win rate analysis, to give credit to individual accomplishments and to not discard team achievements entirely.
And these are the texts from the 2nd:
+ Show Spoiler +
As a critique of the first article by others:
b. Including match win rates of team events is not enough to honor the accomplishments of players and team events should be included in the tournament score as well
and
Team result handling
For the team result multipliers that were newly added, I did the following:
I checked the win rate of a given player. If it was below 50% then the tournament was not counted for that player, because if everyone had this player's win rate, the team would have never gotten an upper placement in the league. This result is an indicator that a player was lifted up by his team-mates and thus, there should be no points handed out. It serves as an entrance barrier and as a marker for contribution. It also takes away one of my concerns for including team-results.
One could argue that the entrance barrier should be higher, but adding more to a team than being neutral or a burden is fine for me.
There will be another new multiplier, named participation-multiplier.
Why is that necessary? For example: A team played 60 games in a given season and the player only participated in 2 games, his contribution is extremely small. The fairest and most practical idea I had was to incorporate a participation rate.
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Northern Ireland25933 Posts
On October 25 2025 14:05 rwala wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2025 02:56 Balnazza wrote:I really want to stay out of the discussion, just to avoid repeating the same-old arguments in both directions, especially on a thread that isn't even really about the GOAT-topic...but I have to ask: On October 23 2025 15:01 rwala wrote:
You're right about Rogue but Maru was the best player in the world for many stints pre-2018.
What year(s) pre-2018 would anyone consider Maru to be the best player in the world? Even if you would do the ludicrous thing to proclaim him the best player after winning his two Premier events pre-2018...that would still just be two 'stints', which in my book hardly count as "many". Most of 2016 Proleague when he accomplished one of the greatest feats in all of SC. But I’d be happy to concede he wasn’t the best player as much as Inno, Rain, Zest, TY, MVP, and probably others. You can go back and watch Proleague and that’s what Wolf, GTR, Valdez were saying. A lot of the modern fans don’t really remember or even value Proleague because they never watched it or cared much about it and would probably point out that Maru didn’t even make Blizzcon in 2016. Neither did Inno, and in fact many Korean GOATs failed to break through region lock since they unfortunately didn’t have the region lock near autoqualify that got players like Elazer and Special in.
The scene has always been more individual tournament focused in perception, and team leagues in general go a bit under the radar. Taeja at IPL TAC, Inno in GSTL, Serral in NationWars, are also rarely mentioned in such discussions, although I’m not saying those are equivalently prestigious leagues to Proleague.
I’ve not discounted Proleague from consideration, I factor it between players who competed in it, and not for comparison with players who did not.
It’s also just a completely different format, and one where the team element is a big factor. Outside of Starleagues, the majority of tournies are weekend gauntlets where players largely have to think on their feet in navigating it.
It also only ran for a few years in a 15 year scene, and it was a very closed off competition. If we’re gonna talk about regional lock and its effects, which is a fair observation, you have to apply that to Proleague as well.
So I just find it difficult to factor in, that doesn’t mean I think it’s irrelevant or anything, but it’s simply easier to compare like with like.
The Ryder and Davis Cups in golf and tennis are big, prestige deals in golf and tennis respectively. Performance in them doesn’t tend to factor too prominently in GOAT debates because the rest of their circuits are all individual competitions.
I think it’s a little similar here, but a bit different in Kespa Brood War times because Proleague was such an integral part of that scene for so long.
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On October 25 2025 14:05 rwala wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2025 02:56 Balnazza wrote:I really want to stay out of the discussion, just to avoid repeating the same-old arguments in both directions, especially on a thread that isn't even really about the GOAT-topic...but I have to ask: On October 23 2025 15:01 rwala wrote:
You're right about Rogue but Maru was the best player in the world for many stints pre-2018.
What year(s) pre-2018 would anyone consider Maru to be the best player in the world? Even if you would do the ludicrous thing to proclaim him the best player after winning his two Premier events pre-2018...that would still just be two 'stints', which in my book hardly count as "many". Most of 2016 Proleague when he accomplished one of the greatest feats in all of SC. But I’d be happy to concede he wasn’t the best player as much as Inno, Rain, Zest, TY, MVP, and probably others. You can go back and watch Proleague and that’s what Wolf, GTR, Valdez were saying. A lot of the modern fans don’t really remember or even value Proleague because they never watched it or cared much about it and would probably point out that Maru didn’t even make Blizzcon in 2016. Neither did Inno, and in fact many Korean GOATs failed to break through region lock since they unfortunately didn’t have the region lock near autoqualify that got players like Elazer and Special in.
How can Proleague (as you proclaim later on) be the most competite thing in 2016 when Maru AND Inno didn't make it into Blizzcon that year? Clearly Blizzcon is more competitive to get in. Also, sorry, but people overexaggurate Marus Proleague '16 slightly...he had an incredibly high winrate, but in terms of actual points, he was equal or behind herO Stats. Not to mention that most of his success came from Mirrormatches of all things. And if you look into Jin Airs playoffs runs, it is noteworthy that most of the heaviy-lifting did get done by Cure and especially sOs.
Maru didn't "fail to break through regionlock", he missed the qualification-line by over 3000 points, that's equal to more than a GSL-2nd place.
It is also funny that you proclaim people don't remember Proleague and then completly misrepresent how easy it is/was for foreigner to get into Blizzcon. Especially since you hand-picked Elazer, a player who only very barely got into Blizzcon 2016, he narrowly avoided to have to play a LastChance decider against Violet to get in (it got a bit less dramatic afterwards because Polt dropped out aswell). There was no "near autoqualify".
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Northern Ireland25933 Posts
On October 25 2025 22:19 Balnazza wrote:Show nested quote +On October 25 2025 14:05 rwala wrote:On October 24 2025 02:56 Balnazza wrote:I really want to stay out of the discussion, just to avoid repeating the same-old arguments in both directions, especially on a thread that isn't even really about the GOAT-topic...but I have to ask: On October 23 2025 15:01 rwala wrote:
You're right about Rogue but Maru was the best player in the world for many stints pre-2018.
What year(s) pre-2018 would anyone consider Maru to be the best player in the world? Even if you would do the ludicrous thing to proclaim him the best player after winning his two Premier events pre-2018...that would still just be two 'stints', which in my book hardly count as "many". Most of 2016 Proleague when he accomplished one of the greatest feats in all of SC. But I’d be happy to concede he wasn’t the best player as much as Inno, Rain, Zest, TY, MVP, and probably others. You can go back and watch Proleague and that’s what Wolf, GTR, Valdez were saying. A lot of the modern fans don’t really remember or even value Proleague because they never watched it or cared much about it and would probably point out that Maru didn’t even make Blizzcon in 2016. Neither did Inno, and in fact many Korean GOATs failed to break through region lock since they unfortunately didn’t have the region lock near autoqualify that got players like Elazer and Special in. How can Proleague (as you proclaim later on) be the most competite thing in 2016 when Maru AND Inno didn't make it into Blizzcon that year? Clearly Blizzcon is more competitive to get in. Also, sorry, but people overexaggurate Marus Proleague '16 slightly...he had an incredibly high winrate, but in terms of actual points, he was equal or behind herO. Not to mention that most of his success came from Mirrormatches of all things. And if you look into Jin Airs playoffs runs, it is noteworthy that most of the heaviy-lifting did get done by Cure and especially sOs. Maru didn't "fail to break through regionlock", he missed the qualification-line by over 3000 points, that's equal to more than a GSL-2nd place. It is also funny that you proclaim people don't remember Proleague and then completly misrepresent how easy it is/was for foreigner to get into Blizzcon. Especially since you hand-picked Elazer, a player who only very barely got into Blizzcon 2016, he narrowly avoided to have to play a LastChance decider against Violet to get in (it got a bit less dramatic afterwards because Polt dropped out aswell). There was no "near autoqualify".
You’ve also got team tactics to factor in. I’d have to go and look over those times, and perhaps I shall at some point!
All-kill versus set picking depending on what format is going at a particular time.
If you’re facing a team with a real killer ace player, who’s favoured against even your best player, it can be the prudent play to try and predict when they’re sent out and put out your weakest. Play the percentages.
As I’ve already said I also haven’t checked so nobody @
me yet haha, and it’s also something of a compliment to the ace player in the first place, but I think it’s conceivable that super aces get a slight boost in that kind of scenario.
There’s obviously a lot of variance, but in an ideal world you send out a lineup that’s favoured in every matchup, be it sheer quality of player, matchup speciality or a particular map strat.
As I said I don’t remotely discount things like Proleague, there’s just a lot of added complexity that makes it tricky.
I think the region lock point on WCs does have some merit, but equally if you’re the GOAT and can’t even qualify on occasions? Surely that’s a minus, even if a minor one.
At this juncture I think Maru’s had more shots at a WC than any other player and hasn’t won one, even in the weaker era.
Personally I think he’s top 3 in pure SC skill, and probably top 2 GOAT, but I think he kinda blew his shot to be the GOAT when he lost to Oliveira. The stars aligned, his TvT was crazy at the time and he’s facing the biggest WC finalist underdog and he couldn’t deliver.
In more recent times I don’t really hold stuff like Serral battering him against him, he’s basically the longest serving pro, has injuries etc
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On October 24 2025 02:56 Balnazza wrote:I really want to stay out of the discussion, just to avoid repeating the same-old arguments in both directions, especially on a thread that isn't even really about the GOAT-topic...but I have to ask: Show nested quote +On October 23 2025 15:01 rwala wrote:
You're right about Rogue but Maru was the best player in the world for many stints pre-2018.
What year(s) pre-2018 would anyone consider Maru to be the best player in the world? Even if you would do the ludicrous thing to proclaim him the best player after winning his two Premier events pre-2018...that would still just be two 'stints', which in my book hardly count as "many".
Only the Maru fans, majority had Maru sitting comfortably outside of top 5. Maru was basically a gatekeeper before he broke out in 2018. His ssl path run was quite easy due to luck bracket
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On October 25 2025 14:05 rwala wrote:Show nested quote +On October 24 2025 02:56 Balnazza wrote:I really want to stay out of the discussion, just to avoid repeating the same-old arguments in both directions, especially on a thread that isn't even really about the GOAT-topic...but I have to ask: On October 23 2025 15:01 rwala wrote:
You're right about Rogue but Maru was the best player in the world for many stints pre-2018.
What year(s) pre-2018 would anyone consider Maru to be the best player in the world? Even if you would do the ludicrous thing to proclaim him the best player after winning his two Premier events pre-2018...that would still just be two 'stints', which in my book hardly count as "many". Most of 2016 Proleague when he accomplished one of the greatest feats in all of SC. But I’d be happy to concede he wasn’t the best player as much as Inno, Rain, Zest, TY, MVP, and probably others. You can go back and watch Proleague and that’s what Wolf, GTR, Valdez were saying. A lot of the modern fans don’t really remember or even value Proleague because they never watched it or cared much about it and would probably point out that Maru didn’t even make Blizzcon in 2016. Neither did Inno, and in fact many Korean GOATs failed to break through region lock since they unfortunately didn’t have the region lock near autoqualify that got players like Elazer and Special in.
lol why are people still trying to over exaggerate pro league.
It has already been proven thwt league was a match fixing league.
We just don’t know how many other games were fixed beside the one that was caught
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EPT
