With his steady performance and strong performance in major events, Helvijs "broky" Saukants was selected for the first time in the HLTV Top 20 players of the year.
2021 Best Players of the Year TOP 20 Players Introduction:
Broky is a typical example of a rising star player entering the CSGO professional circle. His interest in gaming was sparked through his time with his brothers in CS 1.6, and as the game became more professional, he realized that he could be discovered by professional teams through the FPL like ropz.
"I learned about CS in a very classic way, when I was very young I would watch my brothers play CS 1.6 and then go up and cool it when no one was playing with the computer. I started following professional competitions in 2015, and the moment of passion to see the players and spectators fascinates me to watch almost every game. ”
"It wasn't until 2017 that I wanted to really play CSGO professionally, and before that I just played a lot of ladders. When I saw the ropz jump from FPL to THE MOUZ, I started frantically rowing the FACEIT ladder. I was greatly inspired to see some people from the Baltic states enter the first team in an 'unusual way'. I qualified for FPL-c in June 2018, and then I made it to FPL a month later, when I realized that I could become a professional brother. ”
Although Brooky has played offline in the Wolfung team several times, his development did not come from Home. Yekindar talked about the rapid development of 2019, explaining that Broky has become famous in FACEIT much faster than he has in Latvia. It was at the FPL that he showed that he could compete with the best players in the world, which gave him the privilege of being invited to join Wolsung, Epsilon and FaZe.
Broky competed with Wolsung in the first Baltic offline event in 2018 and won multiple titles since then, but it wasn't until 2019 that he joined the first truly professional team, Epsilon. Under SPELLAN's leadership they managed to make a slight impact in Europe's top flight, winning the ISEA Premier S30 and finishing 22nd in the world, but broky never attracted much attention in the team. As an auxiliary player to the team, his use of AWP is limited to the CT side of some maps, and from the data, he is only a medium level player, ranking behind K1to and CRUC1AL.
That's why the news that he joined FaZe and NiKo was so surprising. FaZe, the club named the "Legendary Player", chose to give Broky a chance after spending most of his budget on Coldzera. That month, Broky went on a big spree at the FPL, winning 69 percent of the FPL matches.
Who would have thought that the teenager would eventually become a long-term FaZe signing?
"As far as I know, NiKo just added my Steam buddies and asked some questions, and then a few days later I went to the trial. I think the reason I was chosen was because I played the FPL with some FaZe players, so if it wasn't for those matches, FaZe might have signed anyone else. ”
"Compared to myself today and in 2019, I can definitely say that as a person, I have become more mature and cheerful. Playing for FaZe didn't make much of an impact on me, maybe the moment I joined FaZe, it had an impact. ”
Joining a top team and getting used to playing with the in-game superstars wasn't an easy task, but broky played a big role in FaZe's third title, cashing out his talent by beating a 1.14 rating in the BLAST Pro Series Copenhagen. At that time, broky and the team were still running into each other, at first olofmeister was still fighting on the offensive side, and broky was still in the role of the attacker. Then in early 2020, Broky was still trapped in his own defensive sniper dilemma, with only 30% of the kills coming from the sniper in his hand. Over time, especially with the departure of NiKo at the end of 2020, Broky has finally become the Master sniper of FaZe as we know it today.
"I didn't have any experience as a master sniper before joining FaZe, but I had a lot of sniper experience in Ladder and FPL and I was a vice sniper in my first professional team. What has improved me the most is the confrontation with other snipers, of course, watching DEMO and deathmatch is also part of it. ”
"My sniping style is pretty ordinary and I'm trying to improve it, trying to be more aggressive. I've spent most of my time struggling with offensive snipers, so that's my goal for 2022 to make myself better at that. ”
Broky did a good job at the start of 2020, with an average rating of 1.10 in IEM Katowice, and despite role changes, FaZe was definitely a competitive team in the first half of 2020. They all finished in the top three in ESL One's road to Rio, the DH Spring Masters and the BLAST Spring Finals, but due to the pandemic, the race began to move online.
Although the team's performance began to decline in the following time, they still won their only title of 2020 , IEM New York 2020 Europe. NiKo's closing performance at FaZe was outstanding, but Broky's performance was also remarkable, with an average rating of 1.17 on 11 maps.
"2020 has been a very interesting year for all of us, and personally, time has passed so fast that it doesn't feel like it's slowing down yet. After NiKo went to G2, we lost a lot of firepower, and it was not easy for a player like him to find a replacement, so the start and end of 2020 was simply a day and a day. ”
In 16 races in 2020, Broky's rating averaged 1, below average. However, IEM Katowice's good performance (1.17) proved that he was a top player. Despite having a great first year at the highest level, he wasn't good enough to be in the TOP 20, so being on this list is his goal for 2021.
Broky 2021 event stats
FaZe underwent a squad overhaul in early 2021, ushering in the return of Karrigan and the addition of Twistzz ahead of the first elite event, IEM Katowice. The change in the team doesn't seem to fit broky very well, and in Katowice he experienced the second lowest tournament stats since joining the team (0.91 raing) plus an average of only cs_summit 7 of 1.00 ratings in January, and his start to the year can be said to be very uneventful.
"After karrigan and Twistzz joined, our expectations for 2021 were high, but our online results in the first half of the year were fairly average and I think we only had a 20 per cent win rate sometime in the first three months of 2021. After the offseason, we remained in the top ten, but obviously we didn't live up to expectations. ”
Broky found his form in the EPL in March, he played 11 maps in the group stage, and against opponents such as G2, NIP, Vitality, he handed over 1.21 ratings and 1.18 Impact ratings, although this performance was not enough to support FaZe to enter the knockout rounds. FaZe was still struggling in the DH Spring Masters, Flashpoint 3 and BLAST Spring Showdown, but broky was still strong, especially in the BLAST competition, where he was the best performer on the team, averaging 1.12 ratings.
With olofmeister replacing Coldzera, IEM Cologne's offline ignited FaZe's passion. The second elite-level event of 2021 was played in an offline studio setting, with FaZe achieving its best result of the year, 3-4. That's thanks to their own beatings of Vitality, Heroic and Gambit in the game. Broky finished 1.18 in the competition and was the only time he was selected for the EVP this year.
"IEM Cologne is the first offline event in a long time and we didn't have high expectations to enter the race, but we wanted to prove ourselves offline because our results in online racing were really bad. After we qualified, the morale of our whole team was high, we just played one game after another, after each game we were more confident and eventually played all the way to the knockout rounds. ”
'I remember the ease of going into the knockout rounds after beating Heroic because it meant we didn't have to go home the next day, we had a 5-day break to relax and prepare for the game against Gambit.
With the end of the offseason and the arrival of the EPL S14, FaZe was once again eliminated from the group stage, this time with broky's stats slipping to an average of just 1.09.
After the defeat of Flashpoint 3, the IEM Fall Tournament is particularly important for FaZe to enter the PGL Stockholm Major, and whether it can enter the Major for the first time depends on Brooky's own performance. Although they lost 6-16 to Fiend in the group stage, they eventually defeated OG and BIG in a life-and-death battle to secure a Major spot, and Broky played a role in the match again, playing a 1.10 rating and a 0.61 DVR.
'The one who had the biggest impact on me of all FaZe's teammates was Karrigan, who was always able to show something new and made me realize that I could play CSGO more wisely.
The team quickly returned to the offline tournament, they beat the challenger group with a 3-0 record, broky also brought this outstanding performance to the Legends group, against Liquid he played an average of 1.37 rating to eliminate opponents, facing Virtus.pro, he played 1.22 rating, and helped the team win Inferno. Although the final result is very regrettable, broky's strength is beyond doubt.
"It was probably the worst defeat of my career, and after winning the first chart, we led 13-8 on TheAncient but failed to win. It's always hard to feel like losing a game, but I was happy the next day. Because I think every young player's dream is to play Major, and I did it. Although I didn't get my signature sticker, there will always be a next time. ”
Broky was FaZe's best player in the major group stage, surpassing Twistzz and a host of veterans, but his performance failed to win knockout spots for the team, and he lost his long-desired signature sticker.
At the end of the year, Broky returned to the place where he had held the cup with FaZe two years ago: the Royal Arena in Copenhagen. Broky played below his all-year average offline for the first time since 2019, and they were beaten by Astralis and Heroic amid cheers from the home crowd. The last offline match was held in December, in the IEM winter game, Broky once again showed his stability, although he was eliminated early, he scored 39 kills in the overtime battle with BIG, and made his own contribution in the match with Heroic and Gambit, but unfortunately, FaZe was still out of the 9-12th place and entered the off-season early.
"My favourite moment was the 2021 BLAST Autumn Showdown, it was a cool feeling to be on stage, the game in front of the audience gave me more motivation, and the worst moment of the year was undoubtedly not making it to the knockout rounds of Major."
"The goal for 2022 is to perform better as a team and win the championship."
Why was broky able to climb the TOP 20 of the Year?
While the team's overall performance was poor and there were no champions, that didn't stop Broky from making it to the top 20. Broky has always been able to play well against the strongest opponents in big tournaments – although his team has not been successful overall.
At the same time, brooky is also a player who plays higher than his annual average rating in the face of the top 20 teams, and there are only three such players this year. He performed almost identically in the five elite-level events he played (43 maps, with an average rating of 1.09). He played steadily in every game, averaging below average in only one tournament.
Broky also stands out in a number of categories of statistics, most notably his CT-side stats, which ranks eighth with a CT rating of 1.24. His sniper rifle is also powerful, killing an average of 0.36 people per turn (ranked tenth) and an average of 0.61 kills per round (ranked 16th).
Although Broky only earned an EVP at IEM Cologne, he has performed at the EVP level in several other tournaments, such as the EPL S13 and the PGL Stockholm Major.
Rising Star Prediction
We asked this year's TOP 20 players again about their Rising Star predictions, and in order to ensure that the predictions are true and bold, we require that the players being predicted must be 20 years old or younger and have no experience in playing with the TOP 20 teams.
The prediction given by Broky is XertioN, a 17-year-old rifleman from MOUZ NXT.
"I feel like he's improved a lot since I first watched him play CS. If he continues to work hard, I believe he can reach the highest level. ”