TOP 20 PLAYERS OF 2019: ELIGE (4)
Making his third consecutive appearance after placing 12th in 2017 and 15th in 2018, Jonathan "EliGE" Jablonowski reaches fourth place of the Top 20 players of 2019 ranking — powered by Xtrfy and LOOT.BET — on the back of an incredibly consistent year full of awards.
Top 20 players of 2019: Introduction
EliGE discovered esports at a very young age, starting out more casually in Counter-Strike 1.6 before moving to StarCraft 2 in 2010. Just 12 years old at the time, he would put his focus on the RTS game for the next few years, but he found his way back to the FPS franchise eventually and made a definitive switch to CS:GO in 2013 after trying out the new version in the beta period.
He quickly made his way up the North American ladder and got to play in his first notable teams alongside the likes of Peter "ptr" Gurney in Justus Pro and veterans Tyler "Storm" Wood and David "Xp3" Garrido in eLevate, with whom he made it to the semi-finals of his first international tournament, ClutchCon, in January 2015. Just a couple of months later, EliGE joined the organization that would become his home for the next five years, forming the long-standing duo with Nick "nitr0" Cannella after replacing Keith "NAF" Markovic in Liquid.
"nitr0 and I have always gotten along well throughout the entire time that we have been teammates. I think that there is good out-of-game chemistry and a lot of respect for each other inside the game, as well. We have both needed to adapt ourselves inside and outside the game a lot as we have gone on throughout the years and I think that is the biggest factor for why both of us have stayed so long."
Throughout 2015 he garnered more experience on the international scene and attended his first Major at DreamHack Open Cluj-Napoca, and in 2016, EliGE got his first taste of success when the team bolstered by Aleksandr "s1mple" Kostyliev placed in the semi-finals of MLG Columbus and the final of ESL One Cologne, the year's two Majors.
Although the successful stint didn't last long, with the Ukrainian star shortly leaving Liquid after interpersonal issues, it became clear that EliGE was ready to take the next step after showcasing impressive form at some of the biggest tournaments. In 2017 the first entry in the Top 20 players ranking came when he clinched the 12th spot after reaching great consistency and spearheading several successful runs for the North American side, who had brought in Russel "Twistzz" Van Dulken to form the three-man core of the current roster.
With two new stars in the Canadian duo of Twistzz and NAF, who returned to the organization in early 2018, Liquid started attacking high placings and EliGE finally won his first international tournament at cs_summit 2. Following an experienced addition of Epitacio "TACO" de Melo later in the year, the squad evolved into one of the best in the world on the back of consistent deep runs. Liquid couldn't get their hands on a big trophy due to a one-sided rivalry with the dominant Astralis, who stopped them at the last hurdle repeatedly, but it was an amazing year for the North American squad nonetheless. By the end, they were the clear No.2 team and the star trio all found themselves on the Top 20 list, with EliGE making a second consecutive appearance at No.15.
"For 2019, my main goal was to become the best team in the world. We were so close for the entirety of 2018 that taking that next step further was the only next step to take. The other goal that goes along with that is to lock down some tournament wins. It took until 2019 for us to finally get a big tournament win and, with that, we went on a really amazing win streak to propel us into the best team, so that combination of achieving both of those goals was perfect."
When 2019 began, the first item on the list was to adjust to a couple of changes. TACO and Wilton "zews" Prado had left for MIBR in a trade for Jake "Stewie2K" Yip, who had made his way on Liquid alongside a new coach in Eric "adreN" Hoag. The addition of another aggressive player in the former Cloud9 member meant a little more freedom for EliGE, as well as a secondary caller and a source of new ideas for the team:
"Stewie is a player that has really changed my game and the way I think about the game for the better and in an extreme way. I think he has a really good mind for the game and he brought along a ton of experience that he has acquired from his other teams. He not only helps with mid-round calling and coming up with new ideas, but he is a leader outside of the game as well.
"I think when Stewie joined this year I have still remained pretty aggressive in general, taking a lot of duels, but Stewie has been entrying more and it has helped to have another person do those really aggressive roles. The way that he is calling and entrying helps make me feel more free, so I have gotten into a lot more mid-late-round situations that I wasn't normally in compared to 2018."
Liquid had the opportunity to try out their new lineup early on at iBUYPOWER Masters in January and it seemed to do wonders. After a year full of runner-up finishes to Astralis in 2018, the North Americans played yet another final against them in Los Angeles and the new lineup finally won the first series versus the Danish powerhouse. Although EliGE had a hard time performing in the title decider itself, massive peaks against Luminosity and fnatic earned him the first of many EVPs.
"iBUYPOWER Masters was a really crazy tournament because of the technical problems, but I think it was a big help to us mentally that we showed we can beat Astralis. Astralis destroyed us for a majority of 2018 and for us to have a win at all even under the circumstances was a big morale booster for us as a team. It didn't immediately translate into success until a couple of months later, but it was a big step forward."
As EliGE says, the first-ever victory over the Danes didn't mean that Liquid would immediately claim the crown, as the new lineup was still yet to reach its peak for the next couple of months. Their next stop was at the IEM Katowice Major, where nitr0's men made it to the playoffs after close wins against AVANGAR, NiP, and Natus Vincere before becoming one of the victims of ENCE's phenomenal run.
Astralis then took their revenge in another grand final showdown between the two big rivals at BLAST Pro Series São Paulo — where EliGE recorded his career-best map with a 2.71 rating against NiP and picked up his second EVP mention — and in April another runner-up finish came at the following BLAST stop in Miami, with FaZe being on the other end of the title decider that time around.
It wasn't until May that Liquid showed progress by breaking their Big-Event title duck at IEM Sydney, taking advantage of the missing Astralis as they beat fnatic in a tough best-of-five grand final, which marked the beginning of a fantastic run of form for EliGE and the team as a whole.
"It felt amazing having that win against fnatic in the IEM Sydney final. Fnatic has always been a really solid team, so having our first big tournament win there in front of that crowd let us finally feel what it is like to win. Winning iBP was great because it was against Astralis specifically, but it didn't feel as good because of the problems. At IEM Sydney there were no factors like that so it was a good win against one of the best organizations in CS."
Although three weeks later they added a third runner-up finish to their tally at cs_summit 4 with Vitality dealing them the final blow, Liquid were immediately back to winning ways when they traveled to Dallas for DreamHack Masters. The $250,000 tournament proved to be a milestone for EliGE, whose standout play in the semi-final and grand final matchups against FURIA and ENCE and incredible consistency overall earned him his first-ever MVP. Big matches like that had been an area in which the American faltered in 2018 and — when it came to finals at least — at the beginning of 2019, but that didn't seem to be a problem anymore in either of the team's triumphs in Australia and Texas.
"I don't think there was anything specific that made me not play as well in bigger matches. It was just that all of those bigger matches in 2018 were against Astralis and when you are playing aggressively against a way better team then you are going to have a lot of rough matches. You aren't able to get the same types of duels and opportunities against a really good team like Astralis compared to other teams. As a team, we improved a lot, which gave me opportunities to play better individually, and also Stewie and Twistzz were doing a lot of heavy aggressive fights, which let me play off of them well."
Becoming a back-to-back MVP, he maintained the same form at ESL Pro League Season 9 Finals, where Liquid added another Astralis scalp in the quarter-finals before also taking down mousesports and G2 as they rallied to their third consecutive Big-Event title, with EliGE looking unstoppable.
"A big part of my improvement in 2019 was confidence in myself and trying to make sure I was solving problems more often. A lot of times when people are practicing and losing to a certain thing, they don't go the extra distance to think of how to fix that problem. It seems really obvious, but I don't think it is as actively worked on as it should be.
"zews and TACO talked about that while they were on the team, about how when TACO is having a problem with a certain play that is happening or a certain situation, then he will brainstorm or watch demos of other players to see how to beat that. That is one of the main things that I did in 2019 and will continue to do with note-taking and making sure that any situation that I am uncomfortable with gets written down and is fixed."
Securing three notches in the Intel Grand Slam race in as many tournaments, Liquid entered ESL One Cologne with an obvious goal ahead of them and they delivered yet again. MVP PK, Natus Vincere, and NRG all proved to be a challenge, but once the North American team reached the grand final, Vitality went down in convincing fashion as EliGE & co. completed the Intel Grand Slam in just 63 days. That time around, the highest award went to Mathieu "ZywOo" Herbaut, who had simply been too dominant to overcome, but EliGE was once again the leading man behind his team's success as the second-best player of one of the most stacked tournaments of the year.
"My best memory from 2019 is our easily our win in Cologne. Winning the grand slam and getting all of those wins in a row in one of the most respected arenas of Counter-Strike couldn't have been a better dream scenario."
EliGE took a back seat at BLAST Pro Series Los Angeles, where Liquid's other stars were in the spotlight as their rampage continued with a fifth consecutive big title, but he clinched his third MVP award as the first half of the year came to an end at IEM Chicago. It was possibly the best we had ever seen the 22-year-old play, as he put up a 1.41 rating in Illinois thanks to key performances from start to finish, with a 1.62 rating and 104 ADR in a dominant best-of-five triumph over ENCE capping off the spectacular run in the first part of the season.
"It was the most successful I have ever been in my career and it was amazing to feel so unbeatable. I really felt like we were going to beat any team that we played. Any peek that I took, I was going to win it. We had everyone from the team that was able to win a round all by themselves at any point. Having that type of confidence in your teammates makes you feel really free to do some crazy plays sometimes because you know they can pick up the slack if your play doesn't work out."
After a well-deserved break, Liquid went into the StarLadder Major as the clear No.1 team, but they looked far from their previous level. Although they started off on the right foot, the North Americans was on the verge of elimination after losing maps to NRG and AVANGAR and had to come back to squeeze through to the playoffs, taking down mousesports in a tough series to make it there by the skin of their teeth. By the time they reached the playoffs, it was clear that Liquid weren't in championship-winning form, and on top of that they met a red-hot Astralis in the quarter-finals and their campaign at the second Major ended.
"I think our dropoff was a combination of a couple things. We felt really off-page when we started practicing again, where everything wasn't clicking like it had. We were going over what we had before and making sure that stayed intact instead of everyone retaining and innovating new ideas. It is really important to make sure you keep the same foundation that you had before, but I think it took too long for that to come back so we essentially had the same playbook as we did from before the break, but during / after the break a lot of teams had studied us and were innovating on their own."
EliGE remained in superb shape with a team-leading 1.23 rating in Germany to secure his eighth consecutive award as one of the Major's EVPs, but that streak came to an end at ESL One New York. Liquid were eliminated in the semi-finals at the hands of Astralis once again, with the 22-year-old's unremarkable series against G2 in the group stage preventing him from receiving another accolade.
The team had to travel from New York directly to Malmö and suffered their first group-stage exit of the year at the DreamHack Masters tournament with losses to OpTic and to Grayhound, after the Australian side came back from a 3-12 deficit on Mirage, on which the North American side had amassed 15-map winning streak. A second consecutive early elimination came a month later at BLAST Pro Series Copenhagen despite great efforts from EliGE, who was in as good of a shape as ever, returning to the list of awardees with a rare out-of-playoffs EVP mention.
"The worst memory would definitely be DreamHack Masters Malmö because I think that was the climax of all of the travel catching up to us as a team and especially me. Even during our summer run we were going to a lot of tournaments in a row and playing well at them, but it was still really hard on me. There wasn't anything crazy different about going from one tournament to another one directly after, but for some reason that travel made me feel physically and mentally drained."
It wasn't until late November that Liquid contended for titles again, but by that time Astralis had been in full swing as the best team in the world and ended up standing in the North American team's path on every occasion. The Danish giants beat nitr0's team to titles at ECS Season 8 Finals and at BLAST Pro Series Global Finals, and also had a hand in their elimination at the ESL Pro League Season 10 Finals, although in Odense, fnatic were the opponent to deal Liquid the final blow in the quarter-finals. Meanwhile, EliGE maintained his spot at the forefront of the team, with four consecutive EVPs rounding out his best year so far.
Why was EliGE the 4th best player of 2019?
With amazing consistency, a very high floor, and numerous exceptional performances throughout 2019, EliGE was part of the "Big four" and was at times in contention for the title of the world's best player.
"Whenever I have any type of problem on a map or I am feeling uncomfortable, I make sure that I try to fix that by either talking to my team or watching a demo of a player that plays my spot really well. Making sure the back-end of my game is really high gives a lot of room for my best to become better because even when I am having an off day, that off-day is still really good and not going to jeopardize the game. I have a lot of confidence during those types of days as well because I know that it only takes one round or one play to get myself back into the game and then I can be firing on all cylinders."
He finished the year as the third-best fragger (0.78 kills per round) and was tied for first place in damage (86.1 ADR), all the while recording the sixth-most opening kills (0.13 per round) and fourth-most multi-kills (20.2% of his rounds). That made him one of the most impactful players of 2019 (1.31 impact rating, third highest) and one of the highest rated both overall (1.21, fifth highest) and in Big-Event playoffs (1.18, fifth highest).
The aforementioned consistency and a high floor level show through the fact that he put up at least a 1.05 rating at every notable event he attended and was deemed at least a Valuable Player at all 18 of them.
EliGE's biggest peaks came in the May-July run, during which he picked up three Big-Event MVP medals — at DreamHack Masters Dallas, ESL Pro League Season 9 Finals, and IEM Chicago — and earned top-of-the-list EVPs at IEM Sydney and ESL One Cologne. Along with numerous other exceptional performances outside of that period, that made him the most-awarded player of 2019 with a total of three MVP and 11 EVP awards.