Election years are always stressful. Lately, I’ve been trying to reprogram my brain into being less terminally online. I don’t want to be the main person in a room who hyper-scrutinizes everything, expresses cynicism, or starts a contentious argument. Unfortunately, that’s your average person in Smash, and we in the community have our own form of politics in the annual Top 100 rankings, among many other topics. Every year, you have players complaining that the rankings are dogshit, or rigged, or unfair. Frustratingly, these are usually the people whom the actual order of the list impacts the least, and yet they’re the ones that get the most attention. Should Mang0 have been No. 2 on the 2019 list and the 2022 list? Maybe, but what’s the difference between No. 2 and No. 3 for the literal GOAT? Come on, man.
Jokes aside, it all comes with the territory. Anyone who works on the rankings understands that filtering feedback is part of putting anything out there into the world. Besides, here’s what’s truly a bigger difference in terms of a resume: being Top 100 versus not being Top 100. While there may not be a large disparity in skill between, say, rank 95 and someone who just missed the ballot, being ranked is a communally recognized and rare accomplishment. It’s still worth celebrating to this day.
In today’s column, I’m going to dive into the No. 100 spot on the list: Smash’s rough equivalent of the “Mr. Irrelevant” award (though, in this case, it’s more like “Mr. Just Relevant Enough”). I’ll analyze each of the last three official Top 100 periods (2019, 2022, and 2023) and each one-hundredth ranked player did to squeak in. Following that, I’ll review what each of these players have in common, as well as what we learn about what it takes to make the Top 100. I’ll conclude the column by picking three current contenders for 2024’s No. 100.
What did No. 100 look like in 2019, 2022, and 2023?
2019 may as well have had dinosaurs roam the Earth; it feels like forever ago. The No. 100 of that year was Snowy, a Jigglypuff player who rose to prominence as one of Armada’s and Leffen’s punching bags (in preparation for Hungrybox). Hailing from San Antonio, a region he ruled at a relatively young age, Snowy finally broke through on a national level in 2019. Although he didn’t attend many events, when he showed up, he was very hit or miss. Two tournaments cemented his spot on the list: Genesis 6, where he defeated Kalamazhu, and King, a Tristate regional, where he beat Colbol and Swedish Delight. He also had a win over Smashdaddy in the Smash Summit 8 VIP bracket, for whatever that’s worth.
About a few years laters, following a return of in-person tournaments, Ontario’s best Captain Falcon player Matteo made the Top 100 at the last spot (EDITOR’S NOTE: I was reminded that Matteo actually isn’t Ontario’s best Captain Falcon player, and he isn’t the region’s best Captain Falcon player with a Ganondorf secondary either. My bad). In similar, yet simultaneously different, fashion to Snowy, two events really made his year: GOML 2022, where he defeated Wally, and his legendary Super Smash Con 2022 run. There, he slept in and got DQ’d from the winners bracket – right before beating Darktooth, JJM, Ringler, and Lunar Dusk. Honestly, it probably should have never happened, and he should have been DQ’d. At the same time, I love that it did happen, and that Matteo basically bulldozed his way to the No. 100 spot by whooping a bunch of ballot names, including a formerly ranked Top 100 player.
Then we have the most recent No. 100 in K8A, New York City’s most villainous Fox player. I still am somewhat surprised at the specific circumstances that led to him finishing at 100. He had three notable Top 50 wins in 2023 at three different events in Tristate – Skerzo at Collision 2023, Swift at The Nightclub VIP 2 (where Swift, to my understanding, was quite plastered), and Bbatts at The Function 3. Respectfully, all three of these players are fairly volatile – a single set over any of them does not tell anyone much about anything. However, K8A happened to beat all three, and all three of them had amazing results that year. Combined with Leffen’s honorary exclusion from the list, it was a one-of-a-kind run to No. 100.
What can we learn about the No. 100 spot?
While every year is technically different for Top 100 requirements, each of the three ranking periods I brought up above share quite a bit in common. Keep in mind though: I was just one panelist from each of these seasons. Technically I can’t speak for every panelist, and what the panel considers worthy for Top 100 each year does shift from year-to-year. Even the ranking prompt itself has changed. With that said, I have a pretty good idea of what typically makes someone a contender for No. 100 in 2024.
First off, you need at least three wins vs. current or former Top 100 players (though preferably current). It helps if you have at least one “big” win vs. the Top 50, and multiple of them will essentially guarantee that you make the list. For example, with Snowy, he ended up edging out Qerb when it came to actually finishing on the list even though Qerb ended up with far more ballot wins and activity across the board. You can also just plow through your way against the rest of the ballot or former Top 100, as Matteo did against five people, but that’s tougher. Ideally, either option would happen at two to three meaningfully large events.
This nicely transitions into another topic that some active panelists continue to debate: where you beat someone matters. However, it’s not in the way that most people think. For example, locals do not really hurt stars. In my discussions with panelists, many generally treat head-to-head wins at majors and weekend regionals as roughly equivalent and use locals as a way of gauging the rising talent pool – not determining if a Top 10 player shouldn’t be Top 10. One source of mine within the rankings told me that panelists are explicitly told to not count exhibitions or locals, barring specific exceptions, which ranking leadership, tournament organizers, and players discuss.
Does this sound crazy? If it does, I will now end this portion with an even crazier claim: even if “everything” counted, I don’t think bad losses, even at locals, really matter. Admittedly, my framing of this is deliberately provocative, but at a certain point, a loss is a loss. If you enter a ton of tournaments, you’re going to drop sets, and this is especially the case for volatile players. From my experiences in SSBMRank, very rarely was I looking at the name attributed to a player’s loss. Instead, I cared about wins. If there is such a thing as a bad loss, is there ever a good loss? Should we reward people for good losses? The whole concept unravels the more you think about it. I’m convinced it’s a whole psyop. Led by whom? I don’t know. Top players? Bracket nerds and panelists who disagree with me? The ghost of Tafokints? Your guess is as good as mine.
Don’t get me wrong: losses can hurt you. But it’s for two primary reasons: they prevent you from getting wins and staying in the bracket. A loss to a top seed can contextualize why a player may have a weak placement at a tournament, but it’s never going to be someone’s benefit to lose to Zain or Mang0. Even if the reverse happened – like when Cody Schwab lost to BING and Morsecode762 – the names next to the results aren’t what stops Cody from potentially being number one. It’s that they prevented him from winning the tournament and from obtaining sets over stronger players. Granted, these two are not quite the same thing – and it’s possible somebody could finish in second place at an event and leave with a better ranking perception than the winner. But that’s a different discussion.
From a ranking standpoint, a loss in a huge volume of results is not going to make or break someone’s ranking. There’s also a funny byproduct of entering and losing – it devalues the ‘achievement’ of a peer having a single win over you. The more you attend, the more likely it is that you will accrue those aforementioned wins, and the less valuable a set over you becomes. If a bad loss really were to kill someone’s chances, Cody Schwab would have never been in a spot to not finish No. 1 in 2023, because he had a bad loss to Zamu. Skerzo would have never been in the Top 50.
K8A lost to rom, HOBORG, and Q in 2023. Nobody reasonable saw my man Jib defeat Matteo, 2-0, at The Function 2 and go “aw, if only Matteo lost to Ginger, then he’d be safe for Top 100.” When purple sku eliminated Snowy from DreamHack Dallas 2019, did it single-handedly stop Snowy from being Top 100? Of course not. It spoke favorably about the players who beat them. Bad losses are a meme. It’s not that complicated. They happen, and then everyone moves on.
Who are current contenders for the 100 spot?
Remembering the past iterations of who qualified for the 100 spot and what they have in common, I’m now going to talk about my main contenders for the No. 100 spot in 2024. If you are a Top 100 hopeful and you don’t see your name here, just know that it’s likely because I think you’re too safe to qualify. That, or I think you’re overrated. In a way, this is actually more of a back-handed compliment than I thought. Should I be doing this? Oh well, here goes nothing, in order of “risky” to “safe” picks for the last spot.
I’ll begin with Yamasaki, an Oregon Marth player whom I’ve followed for the last few years or so. He has a lot of “solid” results that cumulatively look impressive, though he doesn’t have a standout win at a big event. An individual set over Jude, Khalid, Kürv, Squid, Balloon Day, Fat Tino, Goodie, and Artan may not look that crazy, but these are all names that are in contention for making the Top 100 ballot this year, or just outside of it. Cumulatively, Yamasaki defeating all of these players looks very good, in similar fashion to 2022 Matteo.
Moving our focus to Philadelphia, we have Fudge, a Falco player I’ve written about multiple times, arguably before it was cool. He practically fits the “Top 100 contender” title to a mantle, boasting wins over current Top 50 player Drephen, former Top 50 player Matteo, and current Top 50 player Skerzo. Though Fudge had some misses earlier in the year, his wins, as well as a nice little run to Top 24 at Riptide, make for a nice resume. If the year ended right now, Fudge is probably safer than he isn’t, but I’ll keep him as a choice for the 100 spot.
On another note, the epic run to ninth place that Bekvin had at Wavelength may have finally secured New England’s most lovable Ice Climbers/Marth main a spot on the Top 100. In that performance, Bekvin secured a likely Top 50 win over PBI co-star Khryke, as well as additional sets over Louis and Goosekhan, two people likely to be on the 2024 ballot. Sets over Kalvar, Kacey, DrLobster, and current Top 50 player 404Cray, further pad Bekvin’s resume. Perhaps a strong showing at the Nouns Invitational will disqualify them from my “No. 100” status, because they would skyrocket up the list. For now though, they’re my safe pick of possible players for that last spot.
POST-PUBLISH NOTE: This column was written before the results of LMMM 2024. These three players are still strong contenders, but in the wake of Equilateral defeating Mang0, as well as JChu winning the LMMM Arcadian side event, those two deserve mentions as well. JChu has a nice trio of headliner wins (Panda, Akir, and Wevans) along with his victory at the Melee Arcadian (over Equilateral), while Equilateral just beat Mang0, adding to a resume that has Panda, Komodo, OG Kid, and Louis. If I had to guess right now though, Equilateral is more ‘safe’ for the actual list. My guess is that JChu fits in around the late 90s to mid 100s range.