Outside of the end-of-the-year World Championship Series finals at BlizzCon, IEM Katowice's StarCraft II tournament in Katowice, Poland is the biggest international event of the year, bringing together the best talent from South Korea and the rest of the world. Top South Korean players from the Global StarCraft II League are at the event, and the best from Poland, United States and elsewhere will have their chance in the group stages to prove they belong with South Korea's cream of the crop.
In the group stage, 24 players will be battling it out in four different groups, with half of the competition being eliminated by stage end. The top three from each group will move onto the playoff stage, and the winner of the tournament will take home $100,000 and a direct seed to the WCS Global Playoffs.
Who will become the king of Poland this weekend?
Who to watch in Group A
The standing king: Byun "ByuN" Hyun-woo
The protagonist of StarCraft II's esports scene last year during his historic run to the World Championship, Byun has become a side character to at least start the 2017 season. With his early exit from his defense of the GSL championship, most of his results recently have been of the online variety. Still, those results have been strong, and losing in the GSL, the toughest league SCII has ever known, is something all the greats have done. Getting out of the group shouldn't be difficult for Byun, but there might be another Terran still in the GSL that has the momentum and current form to knock off the world champion for first place...
On the rise: Kim "Ryung" Dong-wong
It's interesting Ryung and ByuN are in the same group, in no small part because Ryung recently knocked ByuN out of the current GSL season in groups as well. The two players have similar histories, and like ByuN's comeback last year, Ryung is trying to do the same in 2017. Ryung has been one of the better Terrans of SCII for the past six years, and his heyday was considered near the start of the professional scene when he was second-in-command on the legendary SlayerS club that was run by StarCraft godfather Lim "BoxeR" Yo-hwan and led by one of the all-time greats of the game in Mun "MMA" Seong-won.
Now that MMA is retired, Ryung, a forgotten old player to many for the past two years, has returned to prominence, putting on a run in the current season of the GSL that rivals ByuN's from last year. He has found himself in the semifinals of the GSL for the second time after upsetting one of the tournament favorites, Cho "Maru" Seong-ju, in the quarterfinals by a resounding scoreline of 3-1.
Although his SCII career started in 2010, Ryung still doesn't hold a major individual title. An IEM Katowice title wouldn't mean more to anyone than Ryung, a player that has always been in the shadow of a bigger presence. With his current form, without BoxeR, without MMA, he might stand in the sunlight by his lonesome for the first time in his long career.
Who to watch in Group B
The standing king: Kim "Stats" Dae-yeob
Stats is the most remarkable unremarkable player in the history of Starcraft. There might not be a better player in the history of StarCraft with less hype and allure around his ID. Since his 2009 rookie days on KT Rolster in StarCraft: Brood War to today, he's been a player that his teammates and coaches can always rely on. He might not reach the same highs as other players, but his play is consistent, and Stats once again finds himself deep in a major tournament, this time the GSL where he will be playing Ryung to see which sidekick moves to the finals.
Stats, like Ryung, has always been the "other guy" on a team. Back in the KT days, he was the "other guy" to legendary Terran Lee "Flash" Young-ho. After Flash's retirement, Stats became the sidekick to fellow KT Protoss Joo "Zest" Sung-wook. And then when even Zest started to slump a little at the start of the Legacy of the Void expansion, the new talk of the town became his teammate and IEM Katowice group mate Jun "TY" Tae-yang. Even now with the Korean eSports Association (KeSPA) era of SCII over, Stats is regularly the "other guy" to his lone Splyce teammate Kang "Solar" Min-soo. All the while Stats has been a workhorse, putting out top tier performances and being a great teammate.
When I said Ryung might be the one who most desires the IEM Katowice crown, maybe I spoke too soon. His GSL semifinal opponent is tired of being the "other guy" like Ryung, and Poland might be the perfect setting for him to finally become "the guy."
On the rise: Alex "Neeb" Sunderhaft
Possibly the designated "foreigner [i.e. non-Korean] hope" of the tournament, American pro Neeb will need to be in a perfect state to make it deep into this tournament full of South Korea's strongest. While Neeb had a surge up the ranks when the KeSPA system collapsed at the end of the last year, the South Korean players who didn't retire have begun to adapt to their new surroundings, and we're starting to see the upper echelon start to regain their footing. It's great that Neeb won the KeSPA Cup last year, becoming the first non-Korean to win a major event in South Korea, but a difficult opening group might trip him up before he can even make the bracket stage.
Who to watch in Group C
The standing king: Joo "Zest" Sung-wook
In the weakest group of the four, we have Zest as the top player entering the tournament -- at least in my eyes. Once the best player in the world for quite some time, Zest has dropped off in the past year since winning the first GSL tournament of 2016. The 2014 IEM world champion, Zest will return to Poland where he hopes to add another trophy to his collection and establish himself as one of the best players to ever download the second version of StarCraft.
It's not going to be easy, though. Zest has been middling in online results and even failed to make it out of the first round in the current GSL. Although, as mentioned before with ByuN, all great players fall in the early stage of major tournaments sometimes, Zest fell in a group that he should have made it out of, and his other results coming into Katowice aren't top notch. And yet, like those that ascend into the pantheon of the all-time greatest like Zest, it's impossible to write him off when he still has all the tools at 24 years old to break through at Katowice and take home another world title from IEM.
On the rise: Artur "Nerchio" Bloch
Unlike Neeb, a fellow non-Korean with a rather difficult group, Polish player Nerchio has a group that should be doable if he's on his A-game. Sure, Zest would be a first ballot hall-of-famer if Blizzard ever decided to establish one for SCII, but he's currently in a seemingly beatable state. When you look at the other South Koreans in the group, Jo "Patience" Ji-hyun and Bang "TRUE" Tae Soo are good players, but when compared to other top players coming from South Korea, are maybe not even in the top 10. Nerchio has a chance in his home country to make a run at the top spot in the group and put himself in a favorable position come the bracket stage. For Nerchio, who is Poland and the non-Korean world's top Zerg, he should be aiming higher than just getting out of the group -- quarterfinals, maybe even semifinals (or farther) is possible.
Who to watch in Group D
The standing king: Lee "INnoVation" Shin-hyung
There is no scarier player on the planet right now than The Machine himself: INnoVation. After winning IEM Gyeonggi, the Terran superhuman was expected to go on to win the first GSL of the year while also becoming IEM's world champion. Stats, Splyce's newest pickup, had other plans, and upset INnoVation, pulling off a miracle comeback that knocked the Terran out of the tournament. Fresh off of this defeat, INnoVation is coming into IEM Katowice in the mood to destroy every single person that stands in his path to the trophy.
INnoVation regularly smashes the best South Korean talent in the world, and other than the top South Koreans at the event like Stats, ByuN, and a few others, there should be no one in the field to stand up against the man believed to be made up of circuits and wires behind his stoic, formulaic personality. That being said, a groupmate did 2-0 him online recently...
On the rise: Koh "GuMiho" Byung-jae
It's hard not to root for GuMiho. Nicknamed the "Towel Terran" for his use of a towel while playing (he has hyperhidrosis, a disorder that causes excessive sweating), GuMiho has been a pro SCII player for as long as Ryung has. And, like Ryung, he has no individual titles to his name, his GuMiho's success having peaked in the middle of the Wings of Liberty era when he was a monster in team leagues, carrying his club FXO to two Global StarCraft II Team League titles.
As a player that has always been a fan favorite, he has found new life in the last year, playing well on MVP before the collapse of the KeSPA system and then transitioning to the teamless life before signing with PSISTORM Gaming. INnoVation should have an easy road to the top of Group D, but GuMiho, a player with the knack of putting on exciting matches since even his rookie days, has a recent 2-0 win over The Machine online and will give one of the world's best his best shot come the day they play.
The IEM Katowice StarCraft II round of 24 matches will begin at 6am ET on Thursday, March 2, 2017, starting with Group A.