Alliance's very own Swedish monster, Armada has spoken up about his personal player rankings of this year. He has composed a three-part youtube series, which can be found here and on his channel:
His 2017 player rankings are the following:
1. Allaince Armada
2. Liquid Hungrybox
3. MVG EchoFox Mew2King
4. Cloud 9 Mang0
5. TSM RedBull Leffen
6. PG Plup
7. Liquid Chu Dat
8. CLG SFAT
9. Wizzrobe
10. Tempo Storm Axe
11. Balance Gaming Drugged Fox
12. G2 Westballz
13. Renegades Swedish
14. Immortals Shroomed
15. Phoenix1 Duck
The list displays the, I believe to be, general opinions of the player rankings. With that being said, there has been some controversial placement near the top of the list, namely placing Mang0 under M2K. As an M2K fanboy, I agree with the placement, despite the endless sea of Mang0 fanboys' whining. I thought that it would be a good opportunity to incite some SSBM discussion, which I will provide some quick data for.
Mang0's losing head-to-heads for this year are: Armada 2-3, Plup 0-1, Axe 0-2 and of course Chu Dat 0-3
Mang0's equal head-to-heads for this year are: 1-1 M2K
Mang0 has a winning record versus 2 of the top 5: Hbox 3-1 and Leffen 2-1
M2K's losing head-to-heads for this year are: Armada 0-1, N0ne 0-1 and Chu Dat 1-3
M2K's equal head-to-heads for this year are: 5-5 Hbox, 1-1 Mang0 and 1-1 Leffen
M2K has no positive head-to-heads with the top 5 players
I believe the fact that M2K has no winning match-ups with any of the top 5 really hurts Armada's argument of placing him at 3rd best. However, his only losing match-up in the top 5 is against Armada 0-1, the player he has played the least this year. M2K has a better overall set-count against the top 5 than Mang0, being 7-8 and 6-8 respectively. Surprisingly, he is even with his long time demon Hbox at 5-5, which could indicate that M2K is finally learning Hbox's tricks. Both Mang0 and M2K have been YEAHUZZ'd 3 times this year and thus share a negative record against Chu. With this H2H data alone M2K seems to be a much stronger player than Mang0, especially when considering the fact that M2K only loses to 3 players compared to Mang0's 4. With that being said, the tournament results are a bit more promiscuous.
Mang0's notable tournament placings in 2017 are: 2nd at Genesis 4, 9th at Smash Summit 4, 7th at Smash Rivalries, 4th at DreamHack Austin, 1st at Royal Flush and 5th at Smash N Splash.
M2K's notable tournament placings in 2017 are: 3rd at Genesis 4, 4th at Smash Summit 4, 9th at Smash Rivalries, 1st at CEO Dreamland, 3rd at DreamHack Austin, and 2nd at Battle of BC 2.
Royal Flush! Royal Flush I hear already. RF was an awesome and classic Mang0 showing, that even ended Armada's winning streak, beating him twice in Grand Finals. Looking at the results I can see why the Mang0 nation believes he should be ranked 3rd, over M2K, despite M2K having better average placings. Even Mang0's peak performance cannot change the fact that M2K had been much more solid and consistent this year, which in my book makes him a better player. I say this confidently as M2K seems to be gaining a lot of traction now that he has stopped playing so much Smash 4. Insert comment about washed up mariokart streamer.
I invite any opinions on the matter and would gladly partake in conversations concerning different player placements too. Be sure to follow for more SSBM posts!