MkLeo

MkLeo won his first Smash Bros. tournament at the age of eight when he took first place at the Super Smash Bros. Brawl competition at Anime Expo Mexico TNT 2009.[2][3] At 14, he rose to prominence in Super Smash Bros. for Wii U after defeating Ramin "Mr. R" Delshad to win Smash Factor 4, right after Delshad took 2nd place at Evo 2015.[4] He began competing internationally in 2016, culminating with a win at 2GGT: ZeRo Saga in December. At that event, he defeated several of the game's prominent players, including Gonzalo "ZeRo" Barrios, Larry "Larry Lurr" Holland, and James "Void" Makekau-Tyson.[5][6] Following the win at 2GGT, MkLeo was jointly signed by Echo Fox – who signed him and six other fighting game players at the same time to build the largest roster of fighting game players in esports – and Most Valuable Gaming.[6][7]

MkLeo, who was not able to obtain a travel visa to attend Genesis 3 at the start of 2016, announced after his win at 2GGT that he go on to win Genesis 4, which was to be held the next month.[6] At Genesis 4, he again finished in 1st place, defeating Elliot "Ally" Carroza-Oyarce, who had won the Smash tournament at Evo 2016. He was the youngest player to make the top 8 in the tournament series' history. Playing alongside Ally, the pair also won the tournament's doubles competition.[8] MkLeo had mixed results throughout the rest of 2017, with disappointing results including taking 13th place at Frostbite 2017 in February,[9] and 65th place at Evo 2017 in July.[1] However, he won GameTyrant Expo 2017 at the start of October,[10] and took second place at CEO 2017, falling to ZeRo.[11] At the end of the year, MkLeo won the 2GGC Championship, this time defeating ZeRo in the finals, and claimed the tournament's $20,000 first place payout.[12]

In January 2018, ZeRo announced his retirement from professional Smash competition. As ZeRo had long been considered the best Super Smash Bros. for Wii U player in the world, this created an opening for MkLeo to seize the top spot.[1][13] He put together a string of impressive performances over the year, including wins at Genesis 5,[14] Evo Japan 2018,[15], CEO 2018,[16], Get On My Level 2018,[17] and SwitchFest 2018.[18] MkLeo was unable to attend Evo 2018 due to Chickenpox,[1] but was able to attend Super Smash Con 2018 shortly thereafter, where he claimed another 1st place finish.[19] These wins resulted in MkLeo taking the top spot in the final bi-annual Panda Global rankings of Wii U players before the release of Ultimate.[20]

In the five semi-annual Panda Global rankings released over the competitive lifespan of Super Smash Bros. for Wii U, MkLeo was ranked 19th,[21], 8th,[22] 2nd,[23], and 4th before taking first place in the final ranking.[20][24] The Panda Global Rankings 100, which listed the Top 100 Wii U players from the game's release through the release of Ultimate, placed MkLeo as the 3rd best player of all time behind ZeRo and Nairoby "Nairo" Quezada.[25] The final Panda Global rankings for Super Smash Bros. for Wii U listed Marth as the main character that he played and Cloud Strife and Bayonetta as his secondary characters.[26]

Smash Ultimate was released in December 2018, and MkLeo had strong showings at several tournaments held shortly after the game's launch. He won one of the first Ultimate tournaments, Smash Conference United, then took fourth place at Glitch 6, both in the month of January.[27] The following month, he won Genesis 6, considered the first premier tournament in Ultimate. The win was his third consecutive title at that tournament series and made him a front-runner for best player in the world at the new game.[28][29] In the first half of 2019 he won three other major tournaments, MomoCon 2019, CEO 2019, and Smash 'N' Splash 5, and placed second in another, Frostbite 2019. His weakest performance in a premier tournament came at Umebura Major in Japan, where he placed 33rd; this was also the first tournament where he used Joker competitively. He also took fourth in another major, and took seventh in two others. This string of tournament wins against the scene's other top players earned MkLeo the top position in the inaugural Panda Global rankings for Ultimate.[28]

MkLeo opened the second half of 2019 with a second-place finish at Smash Factor 8, held in Mexico, falling to Tyler "Marss" Martins.[30] Shortly after, MkLeo won Evo 2019, the largest tournament by number of entrants in the Smash Bros. franchise's history.[31][32] After losing in the round of 16 to Takuto "Kameme" Ono, MkLeo defeated a number of other elite players and reached the tournament's grand finals, where he defeated Gavin "Tweek" Dempsey twice - first to "reset the bracket" (cancel out that MkLeo had already lost a set in the tournament and Tweek had not), and then to win the tournament, and with it a grand prize of over $21,000.[33] In addition to Evo, he won two other premier tournaments - Super Smash Con 2019 and 2GG: Kongo Saga. He placed second in two other premier tournaments - Shine 2019 and Mainstage 2019. His high placings in these events secured him a second term as the best Ultimate player in the world in the bi-annual Panda Global rankings.[33][34]

In January 2020, MkLeo placed second at Genesis 7, again falling to Marss, who deprived MkLeo of a fourth straight Genesis title.[35] On February 21, just prior to Frostbite 2020, he announced on Twitter that he had departed Echo Fox.[36] The organization had dissolved in late 2019,[37] and MkLeo and fighting game player SonicFox were the last two players on their roster.[36] At Frostbite, after falling to Pedro "Prodigy" Alonso in the round of 96, MkLeo won the next 11 straight sets, defeating the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 6th, 7th, 9th, and 12th best players in the Panda Global rankings during his run.[38] A few days after the tournament, multi-esport organization T1 announced that they had signed him.[5]

As of the second half of 2019, MKLeo was listed in the Panda Global rankings as using Joker as his main character and Ike, Lucina, and Wolf O'Donnell as secondary characters.[28] At Frostbite 2020, he played part of the grand finals match with Byleth, who had been released as a playable character in Ultimate only weeks earlier.[38]

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, most of the tournaments scheduled for the first half of 2020 were cancelled or moved online. Ultimate's online service suffers from noticeable input delay and lag, and many top players - including MkLeo - had poorer than normal performances in online tournaments.[39][40] At the end of April, MkLeo tied for 17th at Pound Online.[41] Weeks later he tied for 33rd out of 8,192 participants at the Hungrybox-organized The Box tournament.[42]