- [Froskurinn] You've been
told it's not how you start, it's how you finish. And that's cool and all
and very motivational, but sometimes what you really need is to hit the ground running. Take it from Faker, the greatest League of
Legends player of all time. If you wanna be the best,
you need to start strong. - [Commentator] Faker is
just gonna pick up the Jinx! - [Froskurinn] The rookie
season Faker put together in 2013 was incredible. It was unprecedented. It was the kind of debut
year that every rookie in LoL eSports has tried
to live up to ever since, but that no one has ever
come close to matching. Dozens of rookies have won
titles in their first year as a pro. Many have led teams to
deep runs at Worlds. More than one rookie has even won Worlds. But only Faker was so explosive
as a rookie, so dominant, so game changing that within
his first year as a pro, he had not only become a world champion, but the best player in the entire world. - [Commentator] Look at the
moves! Faker, what was that? - [Froskurinn] When Faker
raised the Summoner's Cup above his head on October 4th, 2013, it was a declaration of greatness
now and greatness to come. And it was the final exclamation point on the greatest rookie year
in League of Legends history. (rock music) From the very beginning, Faker's rise to rookie super stardom felt like destiny. Coming into 2013, many of Korea's leading eSports
organizations were looking to form secondary teams. KT Rolster filtered its A and B teams in the winter season up
against MVP Blue and White, NaJin Sword and Shield,
and Azubu Frost and Blaze. Not to be out done, SK
Telecom T1 entered the fray. - You would start hearing rumblings that they were gonna be
creating a sister team, one that was gonna have
these rookies on it, these super rookies. And you started hearing
about this name, Faker, how this mid laner was
gonna change the game. There was all these back
stories of how he would, he only got into playing ranked
games because his hidden MMR while playing normal was too high. Legitimately, the story goes that he started playing the game casually and he would play normal
games with his friends and he would, you know, beat his friends and then it got so bad, he would have to wait
hours for a normal game because there was no one near
his level in that sphere. So he had to play ranked. He couldn't just have a
fun time anymore playing with his friends because
he had beaten everyone. It sounds like an urban myth, right? Sounds like something you
create to hype up, you know, the greatest of all time, like
a Michael Jordan story where, you know, he shows up
3:00 AM in the morning to practice his jumpers. But yeah, from my
understanding, it's true. Not a bad way to start out. (commentator blowing train whistle) - All aboard the Korean hype train! SK Telecom T1! - [Froskurinn] The team SKT built around Faker was given the awkward name of SK Telecom T1 2 A quick victory in the OG and
Champion spring qualifiers brought them into the OG
and Champion spring season and the stage was set for a
legend to truly begin unfolding. - Faker's first game was
actually one of the most like, unforgettable games of League
of Legends that I've casted. Again, like the big question
going into this one was, is this Faker kid as
good as people say he is? 'Cause everybody was talking
about him at the time. But his first match ever,
he played against Ambition on the opposite side, right, who was at that time considered
to be the best midlaner in Korea. So, not only was it a question
of will Faker perform, how will he perform against
Korea's best midlaner? - You only get one
first impression in life and Faker as a rookie, maybe, had the greatest first impression
ever in all of esports. In terms of memorable matches, Faker's first match is up
there with any non final in the history of the game. - [Froskurinn] Six minutes into
Faker's first ever pro game, he boldly announced his own arrival. - [Commentator] Whoa, whoa, Ambition. What? Faker just executes
Ambition in that mid lane. - [DoA] Faker was playing Nidalee, Ambition was playing Kha'Zix. When he hit level six,
Ambition did the evolution. When you do that evolution animation, there's a little pause on
Kha'Zix where you're kinda locked in place and you can't do anything. Faker recognized that,
dove in and killed him under turret as Nidalee, which nobody takes
advantage of that window. That was something that no
one had had ever seen before. Like, people knew it existed, but it's such a tiny
window that it's very hard to take advantage of. So the fact that he was able to do that and not only just do it,
but do it against Ambition at the time, everyone was
like immediately like, whoa, this kid is actually sick. - [Froskurinn] The kill was assertive. It was surprising. It was
actually kind of casual. It was the kind of solo kill you see from a veteran welcoming
a rookie to the big show, not the other way around. It's like Faker was saying,
this is my mid lane. But as much as that solo
kill has been referenced over the years, it wasn't
even Faker's best play of the game. In fact, immediately after that kill, Faker left the mid lane
to roam down to bot where he dove the tower and
picked up three more kills. Faker's story was off
to an explosive start. - [Commentator] A double kill for Faker. What a statement by this solo kill hero. - [Commentator 2] Vision hit six and he was in the middle of his- - [Commentator] Oh, Maju. Maju's doing great, but
Faker claims another one. - [Froskurinn] Throughout
OG and Champion spring, Faker was the focal point of his team. At his first professional tournament, Faker picked up over
36% of his team's kills, which was the third highest
percentage in the tournament. His 133 kills in 20 games
was also third overall, behind Imp and Date. But despite his best efforts, his team fell in the semi-finals
to the eventual champions, MVP Ozone, before consoling themselves with a 3-0 win over CJ Entus Frost in the third place match. Faker's kill counts were
incredible for a player in his first tournament,
but under the surface, Faker was doing something
statistically that was going to slowly but surely change
the way the game was played. At Champion spring, Faker
led the entire tournament and earned gold per minute and gold share. In fact, he was the only
player in the league to earn EGPM above 300. But the real shift was
coming in a category where he ranked second
overall, creep score. Only Ambition earned more
CS per minute than Faker while playing games that were
two and a half times longer than Faker's on average. Faker was playing incredibly efficiently, out farming almost everyone
by securing more CS during the lane phase and
soaking up more minion waves on the map in the mid and late game. And Faker was putting all of
that gold to much better use than Ambition, or anyone
else for that matter. He not only knew how to push himself ahead of the game's power
curve with his farming, but where and when to make
a play on the map and switch between farming and fighting. And because of how well he farmed, Faker always had the most
items and levels possible, giving him the extra edge to create kills where others might not have
quite enough damage output. By comparison, Ambition farmed
slightly more than Faker, but he wasn't able to
switch over into action mode as efficiently. Faker's sense of balance
and timing led him to produce almost two more
kills and assists per game than Ambition. By the summer split, Faker had continued to refine his efficiency and timing. He vaulted into first place in the farm with a massive 9.4 CSPM and once again, led the game and earned
gold per minute, again, as the only player to top 300
while maintaining 12.6 kills and assists per game. Powered by Faker's
unprecedentedly efficient approach to the game, SKT went
6-0 in their group and lost only a single game
en route to the finals, where they were finally contested
by the KT Rolster Bullets, a powerhouse team consisting
of InSec KaKAO, Ryu, Score, and Mafa, with a young substitute
top laner named Ssumday. - I think the moment
where we really realized that Faker was gonna be like,
one of the best of all time, in my opinion, when I felt
like I really realized it was when they beat KT Rolster
in the 2013 summer finals because that was a reverse sweep. A lot of people forget that KT
actually won the first game, first two games actually. - [Froskurinn] Ryu had led
KT to a 2-0 series lead with a pair of Ragus games, but Faker found on answer
for game three when he locked in Zed and posted a
nine zero and eight KDA, reviving his team's hope for the series. He returned to Ahri for
game four and worked with Benki's Vi to tee up
a huge game for Piglet, who skewed KT with an eight
two and 10 Twitch performance. That brought the match
to a decisive game five, which meant fans were treated
to one of the most beloved and enduring traditions
in LoL esports history. (triumphant music) No, not that one. Okay, maybe Korea's tradition
of using blind pick mode for game five wasn't quite so enduring, but it was certainly iconic. Blind pick meant that both teams got to drop the team compositions
they wanted without bans and with the possibility
of mirror match ups. Both solo lanes ended up
mirroring one another. The two Shens in the top lane spawned one of the scene's most beloved memes, memorialized a couple of years later by some epic cosplay from
casters MonteCristo and DoA. The two Zeds in the mid
lane spawn something so much greater. - [Commentator] Tries
to clean it up for Ryu. Oh, look at the class, look at the moves! Faker, what was that? - [Commentator 2] Faker
with a huge play, the QSS! - [Commentator] I can't
believe I just saw that! - [Froskurinn] Faker's Zed
outplay has been broken down exhaustively over the years. Everything about it was truly incredible. The display of mechanics,
the intensity of the casting, the reaction shot of
Ryu's epic disappointment, and the significance of how that play closed out the
reverse sweep and earned Faker and SKT their first domestic championship. It is the most famous League
of Legends play of all time. - [Fionn] I remember watching it live and, I'm not gonna lie, all I can remember is DoA
and MonteCristo's call, one of the greatest
calls in all of esports. We all know this. We've heard the lines over
and over and over again, every video package until
League of Legend dies. Even if League of Legends was ripped from the earth tomorrow, that clip of DoA and MonteCristo
going absolutely bonkers on the Zed Vi Zed call with
Faker juking out Ryu is going to stand the test of time. - [Froskurinn] Faker was
awarded MVP for Champion summer, adding his first personal accolade alongside his first big team achievement. But he was still just getting started. Because of the qualifying point system, Faker and his teammates still needed to beat the KT Bolts again
in the regional qualifiers to make it to the World Championship. - [Commentator] Oh, is that coming up? There's the charge to catch Ryu. Ryu's solo ignite takes
down. Can they finish it? The flash, the cocoon, they got it! Impact gets first blood! - [Commentator 2] Anything's enough to get out that cataclysm. Ryu, though. - [Commentator] He's so
low. He's just so fragile. There's the flash from Piglet. The poison doesn't do its
work. Piglet low as well! Whoa, good pot, Sona. That was a short song, and SK, whoa, Faker coming to get
the double kill immediately under Ryu. InSec, very low. Triple kill. Oh, is this
the setup? Surrender. Oh, boy. SK Telecom on the back of
Faker and the rest of them, they are going to the League of Legends season
three World Championships. - [Commentator 2] And there
they are, partying already. They won last week. - [Froskurinn] This time around, they did it in four games instead of five. It was time for Faker to
make his international debut. Before he'd even set
foot on the global stage, Faker was already being touted as not only the world's best mid laner, but the world's best player full stop. - Yeah, this match features
one of the best 80 carries in the world, PraY,
and the best mid laner, if not the best player
in the world, Faker. - [Froskurinn] This wasn't
some manufactured narrative, either. Faker's opponents knew
exactly how good he was. In an interview during the
2013 World Championships, OMG mid laner Cool expressed
his respect for Faker after managing to take a game
off of SKT in the group stage, describing how difficult
it was to pin Faker down. - [Commentator] And Faker with
a beautiful play by himself. - There was another time during the game where the support and
I tried to go after him and he was unkillable. - [Commentator 2] DS over in the pool. - [Commentator] Fish tank. - [Commentator 2] There it is. There's the shockwave
coming into the shadow door, pops them up, but there's
not enough to finish. Oh, he flashes the wall! - Faker, the unkillable demon king - [Froskurinn] A more
literal translator might have interpreted Cool's words as raid boss or final challenge. But the translator's
creative license gave birth to one of the greatest
nicknames in all of eSports, and it stuck. - Faker has this edge, this aura, this kind of mentality that has kept him on top, all this long. And sure, he's been killed a few times. He's had his downfalls. He's had his moments where
even in his first season in OGN champions, he lost. But he's the unkillable
demon king for a reason 'cause you might strike him down, he might fall down, you
know, he might show emotion, he might crumple, he might shake a bit, but at the end of the
day, he's gonna return. He will put in the hours. He will do everything in
his power to defeat you. And that's why he's the
unkillable demon king because he has a million lives. You might think you beat him, but he will eventually show
you that he will work harder and he'll put in the time and he will eventually surpass you. - [Froskurinn] The newly crowned, unkillable demon king delivered
all of the expectations throughout the World Championships. He wasn't the most
statistically dominant player in the tournament at face value. He finished tied with Impact
for the second most deaths on his team, and his 4.8 KDA was good, but not really a standout, especially compared to Piglet's 9.7. But much of that came
from the extreme efforts Faker's opponents would
make to catch and kill him, efforts his team was happy to punish. And just like in Korea, Faker showcased his incredible efficiency. He boasted the second highest CS per minute in the tournament at 8.8 behind the legendary
Gambit gaming star, Alex Ich, while earning 10.4 kills
and assists per game to Alex Ich's 9.7. SKT only dropped a single
game in the group stage to Cool's OMG. They weathered to back and
forth, five game semifinal against NaJin Black Sword,
then smashed their way through Uzi and Royal Club in the finals, closing out the third game
in just over 20 minutes. With that finals win, Faker
and SKT had ushered a new era for LoL eports, the era of
total Korean domination. - [DoA] The thing with
2013 Worlds was that, it wasn't just a victory for, you know, Faker and for SK Telecom. It was also just a victory
for Korea because in the end, like, it was only the Korean teams really that gave SK Telecom any pressure. Like, they went the distance
versus NaJin Black Sword in the semis, but then in the finals, when they ran into RNG from
China, they three oh'd them. They just absolutely bodied them. And so, it was just domination. You know, that's what really stuck out was that the real challenge,
honestly, for SK Telecom, for Faker, wasn't at Worlds that year. It was back at home. It was against the other
Korean teams and at Worlds, it was only against
the other Korean teams. - [Froskurinn] Faker had proven himself to be the best player
from the strongest team in the greatest region in
all of League of Legends. He was the pinnacle of efficiency, the unkillable demon king, the champion. He was the greatest rookie in the history of League of Legends. Now, I know what you're gonna say. Are we really going to crown Faker without properly
exploring his competition? We know he's the GOAT, but surely there's some
other candidates to consider, so fine. Let's look at your candidates. North American fans will be quick to offer up their favorite
old school hero, Meteos. He and his teammates burst
onto the scene in summer 2013 after blazing through
the promotion tournament with a 10-0 record, and they carried that momentum through to another 10-0 result
in the NALCS summer playoffs to complete the Royal Road run, winning a title in their first pro split. Meteos was a powerhouse,
generating massive KDAs on mostly Zac, Nasus, and Nocturne. Across the entire summer split, he finished with an unbelievable 13.5 KDA, dying only 31 times in 32 games. Cloud9's dominant domestic results earned him a direct seed into the quarter finals of
the 2013 World Championships where they faced off against
Europe's second best team, Fnatic, and instantly dropped
out of the tourney, right? They instantly dropped
out? That can't be right. I thought we were making a
list of good rookie years. Sure, an 88% win rate across
57 games is impressive, a full 16 percentage points higher than anything Faker
managed in his rookie year. And that's cool, I guess, you know, if you think Royal Roading the
LCS is worth bragging about. But Faker won OG and
Champions in his rookie year. You are not going to tell me
that those achievements are at all comparable. And besides, it's debatable whether Meteos was even the
best rookie on his own team, given the central role
of his midlaner Hai. Faker had rookie teammates too, but no one is seriously going
to argue that any of them were on equal footing of him. So, North America can't put
forward a true contender, but what can Europe offer? Recency bias would put Elyoya to mind since the Spanish jungler
won the LEC in both splits, took home a rookie of the split award, and made it to the 2021
Worlds quarter finals. But he had the second lowest
winrate on our shortlist and he was already awarded
third team all pro both splits. You're gonna tell me you're impressed by being third team in Europe? Faker was the best player at any position in the entire world! Winning both splits in Europe as a rookie isn't even a
special accomplishment. It happened almost every year. Huni did it in 2015 with Fnatic. Perkz matched the feat in 2016 with G2. And in 2018, another
player managed the feat, someone who actually followed it up with a really meaningful
international result. Bwipo entered the LEC in 2018
and had an excellent year. In fact, the eSports awards
named him the eSport PC rookie of the year. Bwipo joined Fanatic as
a substitute top laner, but he managed to steal
Soaz's roster spot by the end of the regular season, and then one upped himself
by temporarily role swapping to the bottom lane and
stealing Rekkles's spot too. He was the starting toplaner for the mid-season invitational where Fnatic were 3-0'ed
by Uzi's Royal Never Give Up in the semifinals. Losing 3-0 to a Chinese team in a semifinal wasn't good enough, so Bwipo and Fnatic won the LEC again and bettered the result at
Worlds by losing three oh to a Chinese team in Finals, instead. Even with those three ohs,
Bwipo's 70% win rate in 54 games across the LEC, MSI and
Worlds was impressive. His ability to play both top and bot lane were impressive, too. You have to say all around that Bwipo's rookie year
was really, really, well, impressive if you don't care
that he had played 27 games in the TCL and LCL in 2017, both of which are Worlds
qualifying regions, which makes his status as a
rookie extremely questionable. And if you don't care that he was one of the lesser members
of the team led by Caps, Rekkles, and Hilly, each
among the greatest players to fill the roles in European history. So, who's up next? Why don't we take a look at China? We could bring up Faker's
world finals opponent, maybe the closest competition
for all around GOAT status. Uzi also debuted in 2013 and became one of the world's strongest
players while leading the team within one series of world title. But Uzi and Royal Club had
to really ramp up their play on route to Worlds. They were good domestically, but they didn't manage to win a title, finishing fifth in spring
and second and summer before winning the regional qualifier to earn their world spot. Across all of his pro games in 2013, Uzi only had a 58% win rate, lowest of any of the leading candidates. Uzi was also constantly
set up to stand out by his team's raise the puppy strategy. He was the protagonist of his team and sure, they needed him to
be, so they made sure he was, but did Faker stand on
his teammate's shoulders? No way! He grabbed the spotlight
with his own two hands. Simply put, comparing Uzi's rookie year to Faker's is kind of
like pitting their teams against each other in
a best of five series, and we all know how that worked out. - [Commentator] They
will be the season three, world champions! - [Froskurinn] There's also
the matter of Uzi playing in some tournaments in 2012 that could arguably deny
him rookie status for 2013. All things considered, Uzi just doesn't have a clear cut case for contesting Faker
as the greatest rookie, but we're not quite done yet. If you've been paying attention, you've heard that more than
one rookie has won Worlds, and that brings us to the only player who is actually worth
considering as a rival to Faker for greatest rookie. In 2018, the Chinese team
that took out Bwipo's Fanatic in the world finals was Invictus Gaming. And while IG did have a rookie
as the face of their team, that's because their mid
laner's nickname was, literally, Rookie. But IG's roster also
featured an actual rookie, a bot laner you might
remember named JackeyLove. - [Commentator] Still gonna
be soaking, room comes down, damage goes through. Jackey's able to find two. - [Commentator 2] JackeyLove! - [Commentator] JackeyLove
just found everybody. And that's gonna be a triple for IG! They're gonna find everyone. It's KT aced! - [Commentator 2] That is insane! He just runs right up to the front line! - [Froskurinn] JackeyLove's debut season in the LPL was highly anticipated. The entire Chinese scene had
been preparing for his arrival for what felt like years, waiting for him to reach
the minimum age requirement to compete. He did well to deliver on that hype, earning a selection to the
LPL's all pro second team for the spring split and
third team for the summer. Despite his strong play
and great teammates though, IG weren't able to grab
a domestic championship, finishing fourth in spring and
losing the finals in summer. At Worlds though, IG were able to peak at just the right time
and JackeyLove delivered as a true kill securing machine. He led the entire
tournament in total kills with 92 in 18 games. When the dust settled, JackeyLove had posted the
second highest win rate among our leading rookie candidates, winning 73% of the 125 games he played. He was a world champion, a
name known around the world, and we can't ignore the fact that climbing to global prominence as a
rookie was far more difficult in 2018 than it was all
the way back in 2013. But let's be honest. JackeyLove may have won
Worlds in his rookie year, but was he in the conversation as one of the world's best players? Not really. Was he the leader or even
the main carry of his team? No. Rookie filled that role. Was he the Worlds finals MVP? No. That was his jungler Ning. Did
he pick up a domestic title? No. Did he earn an awesome nickname? No. JackeyLove has an amazing rookie year, but Faker was on a whole 'nother level. There are other players we could consider. Meiko won MSI and an LPL
title in 2015 as a rookie. Ming reached two LPL
finals and the semifinals of Worlds in 2017. Zeus is having a pretty great
start to his rookie year with T1 right now, but none
of the names we've mentioned so far can boast the
combination of results, individual performances,
and historical significance of the greatest rookie and the
greatest player of all time. The GOAT spent his rookie
year commanding our attention with his outplays, taking over the world's most
prestigious domestic league and captaining his team
of relative unknowns to both an OGN Champions title and a World Championship
trophy that ushered in a five year reign of Korean dominance over the international scene. The entire time, his approach to the game was changing League of Legends in ways we didn't even
realize until later, with the efficiency, control, and timing that became the key element
of the gap between Korea and the rest of the world. There have been many great
rookies over the years, but there has only been one Faker.
