By Jack "Jackie Peanuts" Moore
Chag had a lot to prove in 2021 after hitting a bit of a wall at the end of 2020, stuck between 25th and 49th place at his last four pre-lockdown S- and A-Tiers. With these tournaments still in the back of everybody’s mind, early disappointments at the SWT Central America Regional Finals and Riptide loomed large, but they would turn out to merely be the prologue to Chag's breakout season.
After his 49th at Riptide, Chag would go on to make Top 16 at his next four majors, including Top 8s at Glitch 8.5, Port Priority 6 and Mainstage 2021. By the year’s end, he had claimed wins on Sparg0, Glutonny, WaDi, Lui$, Kola, Maister and Aaron, just to name players on this list.
As a player who has been traveling and making splashes at US majors since the Smash 4 days, Chag has long been marked as part of a future generation of Mexican Smash superstars. For much of the history of Smash Ultimate, he was just one big level-up away from joining that tier. In 2021, that barrier was broken. For Chag, the future is now.
By Jack "Trash Day" Clifton
After disappointing finishes at Summit and Riptide to open his return to offline play, Cosmos has truly found a post-lockdown groove, finishing top 16 in each of his final six tournaments of 2021, including four Top 8s. He has even picked up some impressive regional tournament wins, winning CyPhaCon and The Gamble over top-level players such as Lima, Yonni and Naitosharp.
But that all pales in comparison to one of the most unbelievable tournament runs in Smash Ultimate’s history. Cosmos was seeded 35th out of 40 players who qualified for the Smash World Tour finals after sneaking into the bracket through losers of the LCQ. He proceeded to sweep his pool, then beat Zomba to make Winners Semifinals. After falling to Sparg0, Cosmos embarked on the losers run of his life, taking sets 3-0 over Dabuz, 3-1 over Zomba and 3-1 over Sparg0 in the runback. He then took MkLeo to 5 games, making even the king of smash ultimate switch off of Pyra and Mythra.
Underrate him if you want. It doesn’t matter. Cosmos just keeps getting better, and with a character like Aegis, it doesn’t look like this hot streak will come to a blazing end any time soon.
As the human embodiment of Luigi himself, it's no surprise that Matt "Elegant" Fitzpatrick is the world’s best representative of his character. Both in and out of his gameplay, Elegant is explosive and erratic, making him a crowd favorite. Only a man as unique as Elegant could be capable of both demolishing his projected seed as often as he does while still being able to perform a perfect rendition of Luigi’s down-taunt, requiring the utmost core strength.
Elegant’s bracket runs this season are just as unpredictable as he is. He boasts incredible placements at majors such as 3rd at Mainstage 2021 and 4th at both Riptide and Low Tide City 2021. This is in stark contrast to the double 17th placement at Port Priority 6 and Super Smash Con: Fall Fest. His run at Mainstage was extraordinary, taking some incredible names such as Chag, Tweek, and Light. His next and perhaps greatest foe is the young prodigy Sparg0, who held Elegant winless in three meetings this season.
Elegant’s peaks are among some of the best, while his lows, seemingly lackluster in isolation, would have been considered his highs relative to his placements just a few seasons ago. His overall performances have improved, but now his biggest challenge is consistency. Competing since 2015, Elegant is a seasoned veteran of Super Smash Bros., with no signs of slowing down anytime soon.
By Robert "BobbyWasabi" Wilson
At Glitch 8.5, ESAM’s first offline major since Genesis 7, the Pikachu aficionado shocked the world with his performance. Not only did he extinguish the growing fires of Light and Kola, but he also made everyone question the legitimacy of “Game 4 Leo” by sending the legend packing not once but twice in Top 8.
While he has yet to top his Glitch performance since returning, ESAM retains his claim as the best Pika in the world. He picked up wins on the aforementioned Leo, Light, and Kola, as well as Wrath, Leon, naitosharp, and fellow Floridian Goblin. Before ending the season, he snagged one more Top 8 finish at CEO 2021, falling to Fatality in losers.
In a meta where Aegis is the new talk of the town, ESAM serves as a reminder that, still, Pikachu may just be the best character in the game… even 3 years later.
By Jack "Jackie Peanuts" Moore
Always a consistent player and a threat to make a big upset or two, Lui$ leveled up in a huge way over the lockdown period. After placing Top 8 just twice at 15 pre-lockdown tournaments of over 400 players, Lui$ rattled off three consecutive Top 8 finishes right out of the gate in 2021: 7th at Riptide, 7th at Low Tide City, and 5th at Port Priority 6.
Perhaps more than anything, Lui$ is earning a reputation as one of Ultimate’s clutchest players. He didn’t make a single one of those Top 8s through winners side, instead recording a ridiculous 12-3 record (80% win rate) across three losers bracket runs. Lui$ also endured an absurd 12 Game 5 sets, winning nine of them.
Lui$ has been putting NorCal Ultimate on the map since day one, and his top-level wins over both Marss and Kola – both Game 5s, by the way – are sending his stock to the moon. By combining his consistency with the clutch factor he has shown since lockdown, Lui$ is proving he belongs in Ultimate’s upper echelon.
By Jack "Trash Day" Clifton
When Marss is hot, he is nigh unbeatable by anyone outside of the top 5 players in the world. When he is playing at his best, his potential is limitless.
The problem is consistency, which is surprising coming from someone whose most disappointing finish pre-Covid was a 17th at Frostbite 2020 where he lost to Zackray and Paiserman. Everyone knows about his 33rd at Riptide and 17th at Smash World Tour, but don’t forget how strong he looked in his Summit and Low Tide City runs. On day one of Summit he obliterated Riddles and VoiD and looked like the best player in the venue, and he only lost to Maister because he decided to use secondaries; at Low Tide City he ran through Aaron, Goblin, Maister, and Elegant in losers on the way to third.
When you look at his wins this season you remember the way he makes people crumble with his insane movement. We became so used to him being a top 5 player that he can play at such a high level and it can feel like he’s fallen off.
Maybe he’ll start playing Snake more like he has at some recent locals, but regardless, Marss is a smash brothers institution, and his electric playstyle will translate to whoever he plays. He has the next level somewhere inside him, the one that brings him even with the likes of MkLeo, Tweek and Sparg0; he just needs to find it and hold onto it like he holds onto his ZSS hot takes.
By Robert "BobbyWasabi" Wilson
While the title of ‘King of New York’ may be as contentious as ever with the recent rise of the state’s newest prodigy, Quidd, Dabuz claims a new title: ‘The King of Consistency.’ Throughout his most notable appearances in the past 6 months, Dabuz only missed out on top 8 twice – at SmashCon Fall Fest and Glitch 8.5, he fell into losers to Jakal and Cosmos respectively, and was eliminated from both events at the hands of WaDi.
Now with the bad news out of the way, there is a LOT of good to talk about when it comes to Dabuz. From his 2nd place finish at Low Tide City 2021 with a win over MkLeo, to his 5th place finish at the Smash World Tour Championships taking down Protobanham, Dabuz has been performing as if a year-long break from offline never happened.
But it did happen, and much changed for Dabuz as a result. A final nerf to Min Min benched the character responsible for his win over Leo, and since then Dabuz has become the sole top-level representative for Rosalina, a character rarely touched in the pre-quarantine era. Combined with his affinity for Olimar, Dabuz has cemented himself as a wildcard player in the current meta. Practice all you want, you’ll never know what tricks he may have up his sleeve.
Not a whole lot of players have thrived both during and after lockdown quite like Kolawole “Kola” Aideyan. His best string of offline results ever – 2nd at CEO Dreamland 2020, a C-tier win at Clash of the Carolinas and 17th at S-tier Frostbite 2020 – came in the days just before the scene went online, where Kola briefly dominated the meta before setting down his controller until offline returned.
He would bring offline back to the US with a win at Infinitycon, just the first item of a huge list of major offline results for Kola, combining with 1st at both CEO 2021 and SWT NA East Regional Finals, 3rd at Glitch 8.5, 5th at Super Smash Con: Fall Fest and Smash World Tour Championships, 9th at Mainstage 2021, as well as a CVS receipt of wins over high level players.
While it was outside of the scope of these rankings, Kola also just finished 2nd at Let’s Make Big Moves 2022, winning a whopping 15 sets in the process. His LMBM ‘22 run serves as a microcosm for Kola’s entire body of work, showcasing his ability to quickly adapt and mow through the game’s toughest competition. He should be in serious contention for a Top 10 slot next PGR season; it just remains to be seen where exactly he’ll find himself when all is said and done.
Few players can rival Paris “Light” Ramirez on the sticks when he gets going, and there are plenty of tournament runs we can pull from to verify such a fact.
Despite a near-total absence from the WiFi-era, the game’s best Fox swiftly recaptured his spot amongst Ultimate’s best players, cracking Top 8 at every notable event post-timeskip, as evidenced by 5th at Glitch 8.5, 7th at Mainstage 2021, and most importantly: 1st at Super Smash Con: Fall Fest, which included a 7-set win streak in Losers bracket to bring the trophy home.
Light’s list of wins are nothing to scoff at either, and marked on it are the likes of Zomba, Ned, Cosmos, Aaron, Pink Fresh, Marss, Kola, MVD, Maister, Sparg0, Sharp, and Lui$. The question shouldn’t be whether he’ll be someone looking to place on the PGR when the next season rolls around, it should be ‘how high can he go?’.
By Jack "Trash Day" Clifton
After bursting onto the scene in PGRU season 2, finishing 6th, Maister kicked off season 3 with a second place at Frostbite 2020 and the world looked to be his oyster. Smash’s online era couldn’t have come at a worse time, but few took better advantage than Maister. He won 62(!) online tournaments during the lockdown period, using Game & Watch’s literal and figurative tools to spread nightmares across North America.
After his hot lockdown period, Maister’s return to offline competition was a bit bumpy. He was beaten by VoiD and Riddles in pools at Ultimate Summit 3, then lost to Kola and Tweek to finish in a disappointing ninth place. But the 2D menace wasn’t going to be kept down for long.
Maister would finish no worse than fifth at his next four majors: Riptide, Glitch, Low Tide City, and finally Smash Con, where he finished third and took down Tilde, Kola and WaDi. Maister went from the new kid on the block to maybe Ultimate’s most consistent player in a flash. His worst major loss in the past 2 years is probably his loss to Sonix, who is on this list of players to watch for himself.
Men bleed, gods bleed, but 2D walking apocalypses don’t. Maister has proven time and time again that he will not flinch in the face of men or gods, and the next question is if he can add to his list of accomplishments with a major win or a Top 5 ranking on the next PGRU.
Gavin “Tweek” Dempsey, hands down, is one of the most proficient players Ultimate has to offer. He’s shuffled through numerous characters since release, seemingly mastering them all along the way. But recently, he’s found a kind of stability with Diddy Kong that no other characters have really been able to offer.
With his newfound main and a light sprinkle of counterpicks here and there, 1st at The Comeback and Smash Ultimate Summit 3, 2nd at Riptide, 3rd at Port Priority 6, and 5th at Mainstage 2021 were proof enough that quarantine wasn’t enough to erase any momentum from the before time. The victory at Ultimate Summit 3 may go down as Tweek’s crowning achievement, in which he defeated MkLeo for the first time since Frostbite 2019 not just once, but twice.
Going into 2022, Tweek will find himself in a deadly triangle for Ultimate’s #1 spot, flanked by Sparg0 on one side and MkLeo on the other. His resume speaks for itself- he’s more than capable of overcoming the power struggle at hand and emerging as the player to beat. It’ll be up to him to go out and make it happen.
From WiFi warrior to now widely considered the second greatest player in the world, Edgar “Sparg0” Valdez has undergone a meteoric and sudden rise to glory like none other before. At only 16 years old, he fought tooth and nail to become both the indisputably greatest Cloud as well as Pyra/Mythra player. He came from humble beginnings, ranking previously a decent 11th in his home country of Mexico back in 2019. In just a matter of three years, Sparg0 has become an unstoppable force of nature, demolishing anyone in his path.
Sparg0’s results speak for themselves. Pre-quarantine, Sparg0 showed massive talent for his age, peaking with 17th at multiple majors, respectable placings that thousands of competitors could only dream of. But that just highlights the insane growth Sparg0 has shown over the past couple of years. This season, his worst performance was a whopping 3rd at Riptide. He then proceeded to get three back-to-back 2nd place finishes at Super Smash Con: Fall Fest, Port Priority 6, and Mainstage 2021. A mere three people hold any sort of winning record against the prodigy this season: MkLeo, WaDi, and Light.
Five years ago, at only 11 years old, he was the King of Cloud on the Smash Amino app and star of the Platinum Axes crew. Today, his true potential as one of the world’s greatest Smash players is finally being realized. With nothing but time on his side, the young Sparg0 is soaring to the top.
By Jack "Jackie Peanuts" Moore
We might as well just change our name to MkLeoStats. The man is a perpetual content machine. Leo placed no worse than second at all seven major events he attended in 2021, including five victories. Only two players were able to take multiple sets off of him: Tweek and ESAM. Only ESAM had a winning record.
Leo now has not finished worse than second at a major offline event in 22 consecutive tries, a streak that dates back to Momocon 2019 that May. In that 22 event span, not ONCE has Leo lost consecutive events. Even 2021’s truncated season added five new majors to his trophy case: Riptide, Low Tide City, Port Priority 6, Mainstage 2021, and the Smash World Tour Championships.
But even more fascinating than Leo’s continued success is that he’s doing it with Byleth. Leo used Byleth in three out of every four games recorded in the PGstats database in 2021, winning 74% of the time. Even after Tweek’s Diddy Kong shut the Byleth down at Summit, he stuck with the matchup and turned things around by Riptide. While Leo was dominating majors with Byleth, only one other Byleth player in the world managed to win a tournament of at least 100 players: Yei at Anime World Coliseum, a convention held in Honduras.
Debates about Byleth’s placement on the tier list aside, MkLeo’s dominance of Smash Ultimate is something that transcends this game. MkLeo is a true master of his craft, and we’re all privileged to get to watch him work.
