ESL Pro League Season 17: Winners and Losers
Grouping the 32 teams that attended the 5 week long event into different buckets based on their results and my personal opinion of them.
Preamble
In my last article, I ended it by saying I wanted to do more contemporary topics as well opinionated articles in addition to the statistical analysis and logic-based articles I have written thus far. Specifically, I named this concept of “winners and losers”, which was a style of article I saw from HLTV a while ago that they no longer did.
Be the change you want to see, is what I said, and here it is - but with a little spice! I’ve grouped the 32 teams of this event into five different headings with fun names, with comments on their performance and what I think of them (or whether I think about them at all). If you disagree with anything I say, please light up my Twitter so that at the very least, your anger fuels my social media statistics. Thank you!
Don’t Care, Cool Story
The teams in this category are teams that for better or for worse, I’ve grown apathetic towards. When I put a team here it doesn’t mean I don’t care in the same way a Danish CS:GO fan doesn’t care about any other team except Astralis, but rather that they would need to do a lot to make me interested in their team and trajectory, or their results were so drab that there’s nothing for me to say. This should be fast!
Evil Geniuses
There’s nothing I could say about EG that hasn’t already been said, so I don’t care.
Imperial
There’s not much potential left in this team, and I can’t get excited about them. However, if they keep making it to the Major over other NA teams, then I can’t call for them to stop playing - doesn’t mean I have to care.
MIBR
They lost to every EU team and beat IHC. The only real hope from this team is the insani kid getting picked up, but the team doesn’t inspire any interest from me.
SAW
They only beat Imperial, so why should I regard them as different to MIBR and the other NA teams? Maybe one day Portugal will produce a team which makes a deep run, but until then, don’t care.
Complexity
They lost to BIG twice in a row and scraped a win against Imperial. Honestly, before this team had their match against Outsiders, I said I would believe if they beat them. They didn’t, and I stand by my claim - I do not believe in this team. At least they are dropping from that #8 on HLTV that they had for a moment.
OG
Regardless of results, a team this dysfunctional missing their IGL, who is also their best player and most experienced member, isn’t worth giving attention to.
Eternal Fire
All this team did was beat NA, and their roster moves have looked like a merry-go-round since the team was created. XANTARES better realise his window for winning is closing soon and jump ship, because the team isn’t going to help him.
BIG
BIG will always win against a top team to give their fans confidence and an ego boost before they inevitably bottle it against a team of similar calibre to remind everyone of their actual level.
They’ve done it again here by losing to a post-SunPayus Movistar Riders squad, and I simply do not care about this eternally mediocre team with no fraggers, especially after syrsoN left.
Movistar Riders
This is the only team in this section that was in the top 16 - and I still don’t think they have a future. Interesting approach on some of the players (I remember ropz talking about how he watched demos from this team because they do things in unorthodox ways) but no real prospects.
Good Effort, I Guess?
This is the pool of teams that performed decently, but I’m still not hot on them. This includes flukes and lucky matchups. I will also include teams that didn’t get good results but did play alright despite their placements.
00NATION
I can't really say that there was no effort given for reaching the top half of the tournament with coldzera as your IGL in place of TACO, and a completely green player as a stand-in.
It's not really a replicable performance given the fact they beat so many AU teams and upset a terrible NiP team. They certainly did better than expected, but this lineup is subject to change pretty soon regardless, so I can’t put my full faith in it.
NaVi
An uptick in electronic’s form and b1t playing decent nets NaVi a top 4 - but with npl continuing to drag them down (remember, B1ad3 said that after Katowice would be the test, and if we are to hold him to that comment, this is what to expect from npl) alongside the bottleneck of electronic being the IGL, this team isn’t going to win any trophies right now.
Yes, top 4 is good, but having the players this team has sort of sets the bar at “trophy winner” which is why I won’t give them more praise.
Rooster
I have no expectations for a bunch of previously banned players who paid for their own bootcamp and went out in last place. They were in winning positions against 00NATION but didn't have any closing instinct - they definitely choked, but I can’t blame them because they literally have never played anything except local competition.
The only reason they are in this section is because they didn't win a series - if they beat 00NATION, then even if they were second to last, it would be a really good effort. As it stands right now I think they performed alright at best.
ATK
This team is similar to Rooster in that they were actually close to winning against Astralis as well as taking maps off of ENCE and Astralis. For a “NA” or global team like this, those results aren’t bad.
I can't expect them to be able to close games out with zero experience and especially against the “big names” in Astralis. At the same time, I can't compliment them for coming dead last, so here they are. Good try!
Business As Usual
Have you ever watched G2 or Liquid choke in key matches for years and thought “business as usual”? This group of teams are simply chugging along with this result. They could’ve done better and could’ve done worse - they would be in the “don’t care” section, but I care about them a little.
FURIA
The calibre of players on this roster is too high for them to do anything other than disappoint in playoffs (as seen) or right outside of playoffs. They will beat EU teams who can't deal with their individual firepower; it’s their only win condition now.
KSCERATO needs saving, what else is new? arT doesn't know how to IGL, what else is new? Definitely a “business is usual” performance from them.
IHC
Anyone expecting more from IHC after their wins against EU teams in Katowice was huffing more copium than I was when Grayhound beat NiP in this event.
Not coming last by beating EG is alright in my book, taking a map from fnatic is decent, and overall this result is expected. I hope they can still perform without sk0r, as he was a strong player for them overseas.
Outsiders
Want to know a fun fact? Not only has this core never beaten NaVi in a series, they have never even taken a map off of them in the three Bo3s these two teams have played.
Their other notable result is a loss to C9, who were playing great until the final, so I can’t say it's anything but business as usual.
MOUZ
MOUZ are playing to the level their players should be playing at - alright. They lost to a C9 in good form, which isn’t a big deal. torzsi had an uptick in form, which could be a good sign, but other members took that as a sign to have a downtick in form, so it’s a middling result as usual.
Vitality
Everyone cheering for JACKZ must have had some schadenfreude when they lost to ENCE. He brought a good vibe and good frags to the team in the group stage, and dupreeh took both away from them for their playoffs loss. No disrespect to dupreeh’s character, as he’s just a different kind of person, but he is only being kept around for name value in my opinion and there is no reason he should stay.
While apeX isn't a great IGL, he is actually alright and I can accept him staying for a little longer if they replace dupreeh, but with both on the same team there’s no reason to expect Vitality to go further than they did here. Remember how many times s1mple’s NaVi exited tournaments despite him delivering so much and you’ll feel that it’s more normal for ZywOo to experience the same.
Astralis
Now that they have blameF and device, despite gla1ve slowly fading out of meta as an IGL and Xyp9x taking turns with Buzz at the bottom of the scoreboard, they should still win some games, and that holds true.
They can produce wins against teams like Spirit, who are young and prone to choking, but won’t win against anyone who sees the team for what they are and ignores the smokescreen of “Astralis Major Winners”.
fnatic
An eternally mediocre team continues to be eternally mediocre. I like the players on this team but I don't expect anything more from them - there’s no IGL on this team, but they like to pretend this mezii experiment is working by scraping an alright placing at every event.
Luckily I doubt they spent that much on this team so they are probably still going to stay together.
Do Better
Sometimes you just have to put your foot down and call a terrible performance out when you see it. The teams here should have simply done better.
Spirit
This may be a little harsh towards a team full of young players with a lot of potential and many years ahead of them, but I’ve got to say it. Team Spirit don't get many opportunities since they are not a partner team, and they should never lose to this version of Astralis if they want to be anything more than a modern Vega Squadron.
There’s too much potential between Patsi and w0nderful to squander it by choking against the “veterans” in Astralis (and as I write this, they’ve lost to Astralis in the IEM Dallas Closed Qualifier 2-0). They’ve made it to Major playoffs twice in a row now - they can’t squander the tournaments they are playing given that they worked for each one that they attend.
NiP
Losing to Grayhound should really put you in a whole new tier, and I’m an Australian.
Losing to 00NATION with their IGL on the bench in the deciding match to not qualify for the playoffs is perhaps even worse.
At this point I don't know whether simultaneously Brollan, k0nfig, REZ are just unable to perform collectively or whether Aleksib is just unable to pull something together. I want to believe Aleksib is the truth as an IGL, so I will give them some time, but it’s a really bad result.
Bring hampus back. Beg if you must.
Liquid
Honestly, Liquid should be in a tier of their own. Their comments about the quality of their practice aside, they literally only beat Rare Atom, ATK, and Astralis - and they lost to Rare Atom before they beat them.
So much for “ramping up into playoffs” - it’s not as if paiN was doing anything “lucky”, Liquid simply lost. Shameful. I don't care that they have oSee and nitr0 - they still shouldn't lose the games they lost.
If you think about it for a second - EliGE isn’t playing like a star, YEKINDAR is a hot and cold entry, nitr0 and oSee are both liabilities. NAF is the only real player on this team, and he’s looking to move to Europe like Twistzz did. There isn’t any hope here.
Heroic
Heroic went flawless in groups only to lose to NaVi who are still struggling to piece it all together. A top 8 placement might be better than most, but for a team with a grand finals appearance in Katowice this year as well as a strong winning run in the Blast Fall Finals 2022, it’s not good enough.
It seems like regardless of the experience they get, Heroic will never completely shake off their demons. NaVi gave them a lot of trouble in the head to head despite always creating close games, and they managed to defeat them in Katowice only to lose 0-2 in this event.
A team described as “greater than the sum of their parts” might simply be at their limit by barely scraping a trophy at a Blast Pineapple Cup (shout out Kassad) - and their style, which is revolutionary in my eyes, will perhaps be remembered as the first and not the best. Time will tell.
G2
G2 lost to C9 in good form, and were surprised by ENCE. Not in and of itself a big deal, but looking deeper I find myself more disappointed.
It is natural that huNter- and jks would not play like they did in Katowice, but NiKo dropping a 1.06 while HooXi chugs along at 0.78 simply isn't enough. If NiKo wants to play with HooXi he can NEVER drop a 1.06. It’s that simple - it’s what you sign up for when you play with HooXi.
I like HooXi as a player and IGL. Prior to him joining G2 I was actually of the opinion that his philosophy of IGLing in Copenhagen Flames would translate well to G2 if the team believed in him, and my main concern was whether the team could have faith in a player with terrible stats and limited experience. I’m not ringing any warning bells yet, but it’s more of a reminder for NiKo that he still needs to write his own legacy with his own strong performances.
Grayhound
This is perhaps harsh, and a bit longer than needed as a consequence of my Australian bias, but at this point being the best team in the Oceanic region and therefore getting all the event slots by virtue of the regional qualifiers isn't enough for me.
Having rooted for this team and watched them lose consistently, this roster just doesn't seem to learn from its mistakes. Liazz, for all his prior international experience, doesn't know how to motivate his team in situations they are not equipped to handle where he is, and doesn't know which role he requires to actually contribute like the fabled “Carry Potter” which has been a dead meme for years.
Vexite, the “next jks”, had some good rounds, but the team needs to capitalise on their upsets and actually make the final effort when the chance presents itself. Add an inconsistent AWPer and make your best player the IGL and that’s all she wrote.
They could easily have beaten this 00NATION team had they not gotten in their own heads - if you are going to keep getting the opportunity by upsetting teams once or twice per event, start to capitalise on them.
Grayhound did look better as a team but I am mostly talking about their mental game and individual form when I say I want them to do better.
Actual Good Effort
Finally, something genuinely nice to talk about! Teams that have done something to be proud of with respect to their own context as individuals or as an organisation can rejoice, for they have found a home in this article.
Cloud9
C9 went flawless in groups, beat G2 (who didn't look amazing but still a good win) and did beat a string of good teams that you wouldn't necessarily favour them strongly over (VP, MOUZ, a strong ENCE).
In terms of players, buster and nafany have improved in form a lot since Katowice. Calling is still an issue (shout out Mauisnake) but less liabilities in fragging means that when Ax1Le and sh1ro are left in the clutch, it’s a little easier for them.
If I criticise this team for bombing out and losing to IHC in Katowice, then I have to give them some respect for beating everybody but FaZe, who were very motivated to win, especially in a Bo5 final. It’s not a sure sign but there is room for this team to improve and they are already doing so, even if buster seems like a sidegrade to start with.
FaZe
There’s not much left to say about FaZe. They didn't look dominant, but they returned to their “5-10%” edge that they could always pull from within themselves to win, and it resulted in a title and the completion of the Intel Grand Slam.
Through their run, they shook off map losses, (including embarrassing comebacks in their series loss to Vitality) and overall found just enough form to complete their IGS at what was probably the easiest possible opportunity.
I hope they can maintain this for the Blast Major so we can send off CS:GO with multiple competitive teams vying for the final trophy.
ENCE
Is Snappi the Danish Jerry? Or is it the other way around? Either way, another decent Israeli rifler becomes a great piece of a team that Snappi can captain to a result that is stronger than the sum of the players would otherwise produce, and another strong ESL Pro League finish from ENCE.
The only caveat to their upsets is that G2 and Vitality may not have been their best, considering the substitute situation for the latter, but there’s no point in using hindsight to dampen what is definitely a good run from ENCE.
Snappi: the closed circuit hater who does well when he plays on the ESL closed circuit league. (We can work on that one a little.)
FORZE
The Jerry special returns - once again, he makes a bunch of random Russian players look like a real team with real prospects. Only losing to FaZe while beating a smattering of decent EU teams along the way; how could you call this anything other than a fantastic effort?
FORZE were even in a decent position to beat FaZe until FaZe reached deep and gained that 10% which they had been missing in previous events. They should be proud of this performance, and Jerry should start begging his teammates to at least wait until after the Major before they start accepting contract offers from other teams.
paiN
Despite my comments about Liquid earlier, to 2-0 Liquid in playoffs is a good result for a team which never manages the same domestically, and they played a respectable brand of CS.
Even though it was a recent change, biguzera looks like a good player and caller. Some of their T sides looked pretty regimented, and the team could do damage at the RMR and shake up the bracket for the “must-qualify” teams like FURIA and Liquid.
Rare Atom
It’s hard to be tough on teams from Asia when they come over and play Liquid, NaVi, and ENCE. They managed to beat Liquid and took a map off of NaVi - and if I’m being honest, isn’t that a damn good effort for a team that isn’t even necessarily the best Asian team?
This project includes some names from the region who are the equivalent of FACEIT kids in Europe - advent, the IGL (who has flipped between IGL and coach in recent history before playing for this team), picked out two fraggers (Moseyuh and Mercury) who had no prior team experience and slotted them in to relative success.
I’m cautiously optimistic that this team can do some damage in the Asian RMR, but with names like IHC and Grayhound it’s tough to back them fully. Regardless, their performance at ESL Pro League was an actual good try in my book.
Addendum: The Format, The Broadcast
The Format
I could probably write an entire separate article about why this format sucks and why the broadcast isn’t as great as some of the members of broadcast talent at ESL think it was. For now, let me quickly talk about both down here, in the depths of this article.
The format sucks. While noting down team results and placements as research for this article, I was noticing that the “21-28th” pool of teams did not all have the same wins and losses. This is not only true but necessary in this format - in the group of 8 teams, one will be last by virtue of losing every single game. That makes sense.
But there are two teams in each group that will finish the group with the same placement and prize money despite having different results in terms of wins and losses. (I haven’t even gotten to the issue of rematches over the course of the group). Here’s a screenshot of Group D.
Both Rare Atom and Team Spirit finished 21-28th, or 6-7th in their group.
Rare Atom played four games - Liquid (W), ENCE (L), NaVi (L), Liquid (L). Four games, one win, three losses.
Team Spirit played five games - Astralis (W), FORZE (L), Liquid (W), NaVi (L), Astralis (L). Five games, two wins, three losses.
No matter how you look at it, Team Spirit won more games, but receive the same placement. I noticed that ESL simply do not award any ranking points on their rankings for placements below 20th place (seen here), so they are probably aware of this.
This is terrible for teams like Rare Atom who hardly get any points because of this strange system that leaves Lynn Vision as a higher ranked Asian team on the ESL World Ranking because they played ECL Challenger S44, which Rare Atom withdrew from the playoffs of due to being in ESL Pro League, which they qualified for through a previous season of ECL Challenger. Make it make sense.
Similar context can be applied to Spirit, who were invited to ESL Pro League S17 due to their ESL World Ranking, but do not get any points from it at all despite winning two games and losing three.
There are other problems with the triple elimination format, but this example does have real world implications, so it’s what I am talking about for now.
The Broadcast
Previously, attempts at keeping the broadcast focused and serious were seen as a bit unrealistic given how many games there were and how irrelevant some of them were in the grand scheme of the tournament - this time, the broadcast felt like having CS:GO in the background while the talent went on their tangents here and there.
At times, it was very entertaining, particularly when they involved the players or when they focused on a CS:GO related discussion. However, at one point I was listening to a completely unrelated story which required a lot of context to understand and realised that it was just not entertaining at all.
If someone who watches and enjoys so much CS related content can find the broadcast tiring, then I imagine a lot of people clicked on the stream and clicked off pretty quickly, and the hours watched seem to support this - with 5,000,000 less hours watched and 20,000 less average viewers despite similar runtimes and max viewer counts between this and the previous season, as per Esports Charts.
In my opinion, the content needs to be focused mostly on the game and players. There’s no problem with keeping it casual and relaxed, but as soon as you stray from the game, it loses appeal. I watch every top tier tournament and am familiar with the talent and their personalities to a sufficient extent, so I can laugh at Harry and Hugo making a joke at Machine’s expense, but someone who just wants to watch some CS:GO would get tired of that quickly - maybe make the players play other CS:GO modes as content, or do more analysis during the game and worry less about casting the game as it comes (since you are already not taking the games as seriously).
Either way, this tournament cannibalises an entire month of each CS:GO competitive season. It should be better than it is.
Concluding Words
Thank you for making it all the way to the end! It’s been a while between articles, but I should be able to do contemporary articles about ongoing tournaments and opinion pieces more frequently while I work on more analytical concepts in the background.
With CS2 on the horizon, I see a great future ahead for the game - I hope to be watching and playing it for years to come.
P.S. I am thinking of doing YouTube videos where I read out and elaborate on some of these articles, in case a more podcast-style form of content would be appropriate. Feedback on this idea would be great.