Smogon Premier League XI - Week 5

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ADV OU: Blightbringer vs. McMeghan
Several years ago, M Dragon was one of the few players capable of matching McMeghan head-on in ADV, and part of it had to do with how his teams naturally matched up well against McM's style. Based off last week, I assume he's the one lacing Blight with teams. McM's style varies at a moment's notice, from various Spikes approaches to pure offense to bulky balance stuff to bulky MagDol stuff, so the clash of squads here interests me greatly. Play-wise, Blight's been solid but McM's really in the zone right now.

GSC OU: Conflict vs. Zokuru
The SD Scizor cognoscente takes on the unwavering stallman. Flict knows how to put Zok's preferred style on the back foot and won't relent - he's been firmly in control in his games thus far. I'm interested to see how Zok might anticipate and prepare for such anti-stall tactics; he prides himself on being able to handle them while remaining stalwart in his defensive approach with moveset tweaks and specific maneuvers. Whether it's a tight contest where Flict battles to break Zok's unwavering walls or a stomp where the walls either are immovable or get mowed down (I lean towards the former), it'll be a unique clash of teams if nothing else.

ORAS OU: Persephone vs. Adri
Looking forward to see Adri bring his trusty Mega Hera to the big stage - his teams in general tend to be fierce, and uniquely so. If he sticks to his guns, he could definitely take this one. However, I'm a Persephone guy - I like it more when he's running his own distinctive offenses, but he seems to be settling into a more comfortable spot with his play, and I always appreciate how he has been unafraid to make bold, inventive choices with his teams.

BW OU: dice vs. Finchinator
The two Seismitoaders. dice has found his groove, but Finch has not really missed a beat yet. I don't think he's the type of guy to have a bad matchup against dice's weirder choices, nor do I think he'll get caught off-guard by dice's defiant defensive stay-ins - he tends to have the awareness for this sort of stuff. I expect dice to bring a (more) standard team like he did when they played in SPL 8 and they'll duke it out on relatively even ground, where I slightly favor Finch for the methodical way he gets his punchier teams to dish out heavy damage.
 

Stratos

Banned deucer.
I'd like to highlight one of the Doubles matches this week:

marilli vs Ezrael

This is a really exciting match between the two 4-0s in the DOU pool right now, made all the more exciting by the fact that this is the first tournament where DOU has had two 4-0s. I don't think Jon's accomplishments need any introduction after his dominant Snake, and I think few people are very surprised to see him with such a good record. Jon's boisterous, friendly, and a bit weak on tact so he doesn't need anybody else to help sing his praises anyway.

I think most people are surprised to see marilli at 4-0, which totally matches his style. We all know he's "pretty good" but when bunnyy compiled stats on tournament win rates among long-time players, behind a predictable top 4 (emforbes, Stax, SMB, myself), marilli came in fifth, which also surprised everyone. He doesn't talk much in public except to post stupid emojis and complain—he's currently banned from the DOU discord for being too mean about the HypnoGrav situation—and doesn't talk himself up at all, but he's a top threat.

Both players' teams so far have basically been following the meta. We see a lot of sand core, arcanine, draga, basically the good shit. Jon excels at taking inspiration from other players and modifying it slightly to suit his play, which you can see in his reuse of HypnoGrav week 2 and LapTop in week 4. On the other hand, despite marilli's teams all looking pretty much the same, I'm pretty confident he and KyleCole actually built a brand new team each week from scratch. Speaking of which, it's very surprising to see marilli's use of bulky balance so far this SPL since his building partner was famous in his heyday for ridiculous setup bullshit, but I imagine this trend will continue. I don't expect big innovation from either players, but I do expect them to show up with microoptimizations to standard pokemon hoping to counter each other's builds. Though there's a chance that one player tries something pretty crazy here and if I had to guess I'd say Jon's more likely to do it. This is going to be a great match and I hope everyone tunes in, though marilli might get mad at me for driving up expectations on this one.

Predicting marilli to take it in a game where nobody is ever ahead by more than 1 Pokemon, but we'll see.
 
SoulWind vs. Steve Angello - This matchup is a lot closer than I'd have envisioned two weeks ago. Steve played two solid games this SPL, but SoulWind has been the household BW player for years, so it's hard to justify not bolding him every week.

Raiza vs. Kevin Garrett - Kevin Garrett used to be pretty solid in BW, but so much time has passed I'm going with the player who I know better and that has had a strong showing so far in this SPL (despite his record).

John W vs. jacob - John W seems to be incapable of performing this SPL.

dice vs. Finchinator - This game should be extremely close. Still, I expect dice to perform better in it and win, but I wouldn't be surprised by either result.

Caetano93 vs. Pearl - I am positively surprised by Caetano's performance so far, and I expect him to bring a couple of techs that will take Pearl by surprise.
 
ok gonna break character but bro McMeghan why r u being a pompous ass and trying to bait me. like, it's not even in jest. i don't get it.

i play this game 2 have fun and expand the boundaries of tiers i play. sometimes ideas hit. sometimes they don't. that was one of the teams i made prior to spl that i planned to use some random week & had tested a decent amount. got pretty owned by jirachi. in retrospect shoulda played the game differently to give myself more outs by setting up sand and tryna whittle loom down with scald. instead of being scared of the fpunch into latias switch with sand up because i was losing longterm anyway. but it is what it is.

if i clowned u after a loss with such a patronizing msg u would probably be upset/pissed and think it was disrespectful. i keep to myself and do my own thing. why can't u do the same man. i'm naturally gonna be salty when ur poking fun at my game theory after a loss. what were u seeking to accomplish exactly?? i would never do this shit to u fuck off.

gg tho finch u got my number
 

hellpowna

beware of coco
is a Top Tutor Alumnusis a Past SPL Champion
UD vs. z0mog: is definitely the hottest battle of the tournament given what went down recently. What many are most excited for is the spectacle that will happen after the match. However, what I’m looking forward to the most is a terrific match between two fantastic players. Z0mog is one of the strongest players in circulation, which is proven by his excellent results that have been achieved in a tier where he is still "new”. I have had the pleasure of playing against z0mog on several occasions and he is definitely an extremely formidable opponent who has the ability to execute meticulous, long-term game plans. UD is one of the people who inspired me to learn ADV and is one of my closest pokeweb friends! His results don’t do him justice as I consider him to be one of the best ADV players out there. He’s easily among the top five best ADVers in my opinion. UD’s building style is exceptionally unique, and he is highly proficient in the tier. I would not be surprised to see UD use some new innovative tech to win. As a fan and friend of UD, I believe he will win and therefore I will bold him. I expect a tremendous battle that will display both players’ distinct styles and skills!
 

z0mOG

is a Top Tiering Contributoris a Social Media Contributor Alumnusis the Smogon Tour Season 26 Championis a defending SCL Championis a Past WCoP Champion
DPL Champion
38 out of 55 (hope I'm counting right)
SM OU: frisoeva vs Eternal Spirit - 40/60. I am still yet to be wowed by frisoeva while gama is on a hunt to return to peak form. His play might not quite be there yet, but I think he is better and would be no surprise to me to see gama finish like 6-3. SM is def the tier he should stick to.
ORAS OU: Erzengel vs Luigi - 45/55. Despite erz's record, I think his gameplay is pretty coarse. He takes some weird routes that lead to unneeded tricky engames. Luigi is doing well and (despite being an idiot TD) he is the favorite.
BW OU: SoulWind vs Steve Angello - 70/30. I like watching steve play but I think SW is going 9-0. He is just not losing. Weirdly played game vs Finch, but I think steve is a bit too out of form playwise to take it.
ADV OU: Blightbringer vs McMeghan - 40/60. HL adv match of the week. McMeghan is generally playing good pokemon week after week. Blight is too, but at a lower ceiling of play. Wouldn't be surprised to see two cool team choices.

SM OU: Tamahome vs ZoroDark - 40/60. Even though Tama's peak in SM OU is very high, I can't imagine he's too in-form right now. Being the first player to drop out of "my" tour makes me worried for his play in team-preview gen. Zorodark I think will get back on the board through good playing.
ORAS OU: Persephone vs Adri - 65/35. Persephone has been good even if rough around the edges, adri hasn't played a game yet. There is also virtually nothing to rate him off of barring live smogtour weeks, so it's hard to justify not going persephone here.
BW OU: Raiza vs Kevin Garrett - 75/25. I feel like Raiza has been playing well despite the record, and his team choices have just been solid meta picks. I've yet to see KG ever play BW before... so I cant really favor him ever.
ADV OU: Teclis vs CyberOdin - 40/60. Odin took his first loss last week, after 3 weeks of good adv play. I think had his build been a little better he would've been able to pull it out with the back 2. Teclis looked competitive vs BKC, hes ramping up as the tour goes along which I'm glad to see. Still gotta go with in-form Odin though.

SM OU: CTC vs Sabella - 35/65. Lmfao. Sabella is definitely better. Main case scenario I see CTC not losing is an out of nowhere 80-20 matchup. Sabella should win if he doesnt leave himself with an overt amount of holes in the builder.
ORAS OU: CrashinBoomBang vs Santu - 45/55. CBB has been pretty underwhelming. I think Santu plays strong pokemon, but I'm not always a fan of his team choices. Think buildwise I would lean cbb, but play wise I think Santu will win unless cbb changes his patented playstyle up for this game.
BW OU: John W vs jacob - 45/55. jacob may have choked his best odds last week but he played a solid game for the other 80% of turns. John W has not been very good, so if he wants to get back on the board this is probably his last real chance. Pretty even on how I expect team select to be.
ADV OU: Gilbert arenas vs Fakes - 60/40. marcop is great and I think he may push to win every game onwards, so long as he doesnt get too brazy in the builder. Fakes was looking really good in DPP, I'm not sure if his ADV is the same level. He was a little underwhelming in wcop.

SM OU: Gondra vs Welli0u - 50/50. Heat SM mu. Not the one I'd have thought myself to be the most excited for before the tour started. Welli0u probably shouldn't be 4-0 if I'm brutally honest, but he still has been playing well almost every week. Gondra has looked really good this SPL but was underwhelming before it. I'll coin flip it and just hope for a good game.
ORAS OU: xImRaptor vs Sjneider - 55/45. Another one I wouldn't have thought to be a banger pre-tour. I take sjneider prepwise but eke out raptor plawirse. Neither is a slouch whatsoever. I think Raptor is just a touch more proven in battle.
BW OU: Caetano93 vs Pearl - 45/55. Fun game of overly brazy vs overly standard. I think they're pretty similar in terms of battle strength. Finch beat dice in a similar brazy v standard situation so I'll eke pearl out for that reason.
ADV OU: Altina vs BKC - 30/70. Altina is cool -- BKC is hot. He is going undefeated most likely. This would've been a fun time to put Alex in.
 
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