Results[]
Ulti's Analysis[]
Round | Zebes Division Semi Final |
---|---|
Match # | 35 |
Match Date | Monday, August 22nd, 2005 |
Vote difference | 38,994 |
Oracle Expectations |
Samus - 67.05% 82 for - 0 against |
GameFAQs Prediction |
Samus - 85.98% (29,055 brackets) |
Like a walk in the park, the majority of the board already knew what was going to be seen in Samus/Frog. Samus had already had the majority of her road set before the contest even started: destroy fodder, hammer down on Frog, and SFF Ganon before the huge encounter with Mario (where most casuals had her lose and most board-members had her win the main bracket). Samus successfully made Yuri into prison-bitch material, so she was one round further down her road. Frog also had a road set out before the contest started: take out Riku, then proceed to avoid the doubling by Samus. While Frog technically took Riku out, Riku certainly made him fight for it; in a match that had few/no picks from the BOP/Guru/Oracle, Riku made it Frog's fourth match in a row that was decided 52-48 or closer. Granted, Riku was new so it was hard to tell how legit he was...but look at the other three Frog has such close matches with: Liquid Snake, Master Chief, and Solid Snake. Between now having a close match with Riku, Liquid Snake bombing against Sephiroth, and Master Chief not exactly impressing against CATS, Frog was lookin' to be a fraud much like his CT-counterpart Magus.
This didn't stop alot of people from believing that Frog could still break 45% though; afterall, he kept it so close against Solid Snake and has never had a match that wasn't close, so Frog had the chance to be a big green anomaly...until Samus/Frog.
Frog had dominated the board vote against Liquid, MC, and Riku (and he still had the edge against Solid Snake)...but Samus had Frog doubled after the first minute. Let me rephrase this: before Samus/Frog, Frog has only been under 47% for about 4 1/2 hours TOTAL in his four matches and had never been below 46%, and Samus already had him at 33.33% one minute into the match. Let me rephrase this again: since I mentioned the board vote, if you look at the poll updater, you'll see that he DID "win" the board vote since he had eventually sunk to nearly 29% at one point. Now, to be fair, he got himself back up to being just short of 30%, but this was hardly any consolation to Frog fans. Let me rephrase this one last time: Samus not only (wo)man-handled Frog, but did it in a VERY boring fashion. Frog had only had attention-getting matches before this (2k4 had him only involved in classics, even), yet there was nothing to see here once you voted. Samus took everything Frog was known for and destroyed him with an interest-lacking ease comparable to Crono/Vercetti later this round.
So Frog got to the end of his road that the board had set for him, though with more scrapes and bruises than one would hope for. He may have been the final nail in the coffin that it wasn't the 20XX-Division of 2k4 that needed adjusting so much as it was Frog's four-pack though, so he wasn't wasted to those who follow the stats. Meanwhile, Samus's road had more distance to go; she was looking good to comfortably beat Ganon (and probably SFF him) and was looking great for her match against Mario afterwards. Already being the board favorite, there was next-to-nothing that was going to stop Samus...ahem.