Last week, Michael “Steech” Ross, a stalwart of San Diego Melee and former sponsored player of Melee Stats, died. To honor his life and his time as a community member, Oats, a personal friend and longtime community member of San Diego Melee, graciously wrote a beautiful tribute to Steech. I decided to have Oats publish it here in place of today’s typical column.
I was 2,790 miles from home when I received the news no one ever wants to hear. During a work event, while distracted by a trivia question, a notification buzzed through on my phone: “heard some pretty grim shit through the grapevine. Did Steech pass away?”
You never imagine that the first time you meet someone could also plant the seeds for your last goodbye. I first met Steech—like many others in the greater Melee community—at a grassroots tournament in a stranger’s home. I was slowly coming back to Melee after taking a spotty break while I was living in Los Angeles. During the height of the pandemic, I moved back to San Diego to be closer to family, and once lockdowns had started loosening up, I was itching for human contact. Melee was my tried-and-true way to find it.
I signed up for a house tournament called “The Salty Spitoon” and entered hoping to see familiar San Diego faces. In 2022, years after the old San Diego guard had moved on, I knew no one there but I knew the routine: enter, introduce myself, play, win or lose, rinse, repeat. But even at that first Salty Spitoon and despite my rote performance and practically jaded feelings about competition, there was something special there. Actually, there were special people there, and one of them was Steech.
While I was away from San Diego, Steech had quietly carved out a name for himself as a Netplay demon before ever entering an in-person event. He was a precocious “punk” sophomore in high school, with a penchant for asking questions and approaching the game with an engineer’s eye. One day on Anther’s Ladder, he matched with Owl, a once-prominent San Diego player, and by the end of the session, he was asking questions about how to buy his first CRT off Craigslist and where the next in-person event would be. The first event he attended was a small biweekly series hosted at Vega Caffe, and through consistent attendance he would eventually become a tournament regular.
Those who knew Steech before COVID almost always comment on his massive transformation after having been away for a year and a half. He no longer wore glasses; his wavy, stylishly unkempt hair was now simple, clean, and controlled; and he was jacked. He also came back with a more measured and stoic version of the personality he put on display before. With regard to Melee, he now played on a Frame1, having ditched his GCC due to significant pains in his thumb. In one and a half years, that precocious, punk sophomore was gone.
From our talks, I pieced together how someone could grow so quickly: Steech faced family hardships during the pandemic, and after being accepted to UCLA, he chose to come home to be with his loved ones. Behind his disciplined habits and careful choices was someone who felt things deeply. He carried a quiet weight—always striving to do right by others and by himself—even when the burden grew heavier than most could see. After a few short years of getting to know him, I quickly realized something about Steech that others either knew intuitively, or would see in the small interactions they shared with him: he was sensitive and kind. He always offered words of encouragement and support, and he was very careful with how he came across to make others feel welcomed and seen. He would ask questions about other people’s views and he shared his own with an openness to being wrong. The Steech that had emerged from the pandemic was driven to do the Right Thing at all times, whether it came to how he treated others, how he prioritized his health and studies, or how he played the game of Melee.
When I actually sat down to play Steech at that first Salty Spitoon, it was later in the bracket. I was able to win most of my sets that day because I had a bit more experience than some of the newcomers in that room, but even though I had been in the scene much longer than Steech had, he was built different. I remember Chroma’s Twitch Chat message: “Marco’s old [man] tricks can’t keep up with cracked [young Fox main] gameplay”. And he was right.
For the last few years, Steech was undeniably one of the top players in our tiny city, if not the top. From 2022 to 2025, on any given week, you could find him in grand finals at a San Diego local taking sets off of players such as Khalid, Franz, Suf (formerly Android 0), Breakfast, SubTails, and OkamiBW. His talent was overwhelming. Sometimes, just taking a single stock off Steech felt like a victory. It wasn’t long until he garnered notoriety and the attention of people outside of San Diego too.
In late 2022, Steech gained a joint sponsorship from Melee Stats and Frame1, traveling to The Big House 10, The Off-Season, and Mainstage 2022. His performances at these tournaments were only hints of his brilliance to come, and the same could be said about his legendary victory at the 2022 SoCal Arcadian. Over the next couple of years, he would take sets from players like Mang0, KoDoRiN, and Fiction while also consistently defeating Top 100 players in his region. For the final SoCal Power Rankings of 2024, Steech finished No. 8, right above regional powerhouses and nationally ranked players. He was a legend of the world’s premier Melee region while perpetually seeming hidden away within it, only known by fellow SoCal Melee community members and the occasional non-SoCal top player who wondered why the hell this “random” Fox was destroying them on Slippi.
But despite being an exceptional competitor, his priorities were always his friends, his family, his studies, and his future. On multiple occasions he’d reach out to me—of all people—and he would just talk to me about making the best choice about school. I’m sure I wasn’t the only person he talked to, as he had a strong network, and he was the type of person that liked to collect data and perspectives.
Regardless, I felt honored to lend an ear to someone so talented and driven. He talked about whether or not he should continue pursuing his very demanding university major requirements because of the promise that one day he’d be happy and work in a field that was related to what he was “supposed to do”; or if he should try something a little easier that would allow him to be “less resentful of how [his] time is being spent in the long run.” His words resonated with me because I had seen the same indecision in other friends. He was stuck. With the same disciplined eye towards optimization, careful risk assessment, and making sure that everything was done “correctly” that allowed him to be the monster of a Melee player that he was, it was that same mindset that made it so hard to disentangle the knots of real life, where decision trees are less cut and dry.
One of my favorite memories of him was when we were sitting in the Melee Stats hotel room during The Big House 10, and we went back and forth for a very long time on whether or not he should go downstairs to fetch a banana. According to him, the banana had the perfect serving size and the perfect nutritional value for an evening snack, but he wasn’t sure if it was worth the effort to get up and walk and go looking for a banana because there was no guarantee that there would be one available. I told him, “Just go downstairs and get the fucking banana. I’ll go with you.” He smiled and chuckled. He never gave a full belly laugh when we bantered. He liked keeping the bit alive. He had fun just talking, and made sure everyone else did too.
Unfortunately, Steech was the second person that the San Diego Melee community has lost in the last year. Not many people know that we also lost The Wise Fish—another Melee regular in our city and a beloved Peach main. With both losses so fresh in our minds, our small corner of the Smash community has had to grieve with open hearts without much time to fully heal. For Steech, our local community shared our favorite memories, we compiled a photo album, we reached out to each other and checked in, and we had a dedicated moment of silence at the SoCal Melee Arcadian on Saturday with community leaders such as Georgie, a prominent SoCal TO, and Khalid offering kind words and compassionate thoughts. It’s awful that San Diego has had to lose two beautiful souls, but the silver lining is that our scene has had two powerful reminders to treasure the time you have with the people you love.
I’ve had the privilege to bear witness to twenty years of San Diego Smash. From Melee to Brawl to PM to Ultimate, I’ve been involved with all of these games and their competitors in some way. I have seen so many young people enter the scene and carve out their own paths to become the wonderful humans they shaped themselves to be. Steech stood out as a self-actualized, angel of a human being at an age when I was still figuring out who my main was gonna be. To see his life cut short is a tragedy, yes, but because he was such a beacon of light, I’m eternally grateful for the little time I was able to spend with him and learn from him. Death is never easy for the living, but Steech knew that it’s the living’s responsibility to apply the lessons we’re gifted from life’s cruel circumstances to care for each other and become the best versions of ourselves.
Rest in peace, friend.