AGIANTSMURF Profile Blog Joined September 2010 United States 1230 Posts Last Edited: 2013-04-10 05:30:12 #1



Anyway, later has come, I suppose I'll write it now...... (got samurai jack running on the other side of my monitor)



Since this is my first real blog, let me give a little background info about myself. I am a 21 Year old college student name Marcus Bazan who plays Starcraft 2 competitively since the games launch in 2010. I am a grandmaster Protoss player who has played mostly under "AGIANTSMURF", but also under the I.D. "Carbon", throughout the HotS beta I played under the ID "[JLA]TheBatman" I am currently playing under the ID "[coLcad]MLBazan". Prior to Starcraft, I wasn't big into RTS games. I played WC3 on occasion (Vamps, battleships, and Hungry Hungry Fel Hound ALL DAYYYYY) but for the most part I was a console gamer (COD 4 on PS3) Throughout highschool however I played very little video games as I participated in numerous afterschool activities (Chess club, Basketball team, Track Team). While at the time basketball was my passion, Track and Field was what I excelled at. Both my Junior and Senior year I qualified for the New York State Championships for the Triple Jump, each year placing 11th in my division. I was good enough to jump for a Division I or Division II school and started to think about the posibilities. In the end I decided on attending a Division III school with a stronger academic system as I realized that I would have likely been miserable at the Division I school I was speaking with. (I do not regret this decision)



Highschool me



Fast forward a bit and I'm a freshman in college. The athletics program sucks balls but the engineering program is really good. Unfortunately I got caught up in the college life, In the middle of NYC too. I was notorious in highschool for having a sense of urgency and always putting stuff off to the last minute, something that still haunts me today. I got through highschool slacking off to the maximum and putting in as little effort as possible, but still managing B's. During my second year, SC2 is released. I had previously decided I wasn't going to buy it, not being that into the original. But the good reviews combined with my impulsiveness leads to me buying the game despite only having a 2009 13' MBP to play on. Starting out in Silver League with very little competitive RTS experience, I became immediately hooked with the ladder system. After deciding I wanted to take SC2 more seriously, I built my own desktop. Towards the end of my 2nd year I find myself as being completely Unable to pass one of the core classes in the engineering program, and after my 2nd year I'm forced out of the program. I take a semester off to re-evaluate my life. Obviously due to my academic situation, I am ineligible to run track starting in late winter 2010/2011



COLLEGE!!!



This is the summer/fall/winter of 2011, Im doing literally nothing but SC2 and mooching off my awesome parents. During this time I see myself improve drastically going from low master's to high masters and eventually facing people like Idra, Grubby and even stephano on ladder. This is when I start to believe I could potentially become a professional SC2 player. I attend MLG providence with a group of friends. I get matched against (then Vile) Illusion and lose 1-2 in a series of me defending 1-1-1's. Game 3 comes down to him hellion dropping me while I warp dt's into his main via hallucination pylon. Unfortunately he does much more damage and I take the loss. I knock out some people in the Loser's bracket before going down in a PvP to WazSkynet. It was at this tournament that I joined up with team cvg alongside puCK, Fitzyhere, Sasquatch, Yata, kiom, kyo, alexcmoi, and others.



Early winter 2012 arrives and I decide its time to go back to school having done almost nothing for the last 7 months. I re-enter the same school as a part time student. Still playing SC2 but progressing a little slower than before, I also find a job so that my parents stop yelling at me. This time is different however and I finish the semester with a 3.5 GPA, Summer comes and I go back to just work + SC2. In june I roadtrip out with Pokebunny, and caster Schamtoo on a trip to MA for the NESC2 finals. My tournament run is brief as a 4th friend spills water on my keyboard and mouse, sabotaging my run. We drive back with Pokebunny having won 650$, We make him treat us to mcdonalds at 1am on the drive back. In September Just before classes start and just before the HotS beta is launched, I am promoted into GM!!! Fall semester starts up again and I am once more a Full Time student. Balancing the HotS beta + School proves challenging But I'm still able to pull of a 3.4 GPA while maintaining my GM status on both WoL and HotS beta. During this time, My track coach from college contacts me attempting to get me back on the team. Im not interested as I'm finally having success in both school and mildly in starcraft. Winter comes and goes, HotS launches.



After spending the last 2 years of my life basically doing nothing but school and starcraft, I decided very recently that I was tired of being out of shape (im not fat or even remotely close to being overweight. I just no longer have any stamina/endurance). Tired of being tired, and really just annoyed that I could no longer run up 3 floors of stairs without being out of breath. When I go home I step on a scale and see myself as actually having lost weight despite sitting on my ass for the last 2 yrs. My track coach contacts me once more informing me on how they could use my help on the roster. This time however I decide its time to get back in shape. Knowing that I wont do it on my own (even though I have a gym membership, lawl) I figure getting back into track will do more than motivate me, it will force me back into shape and increase my overall health condition. Not only that, but in my absence the track team has become notable. They've won their regional championships 2 years running and have several respectable athlete's. This is something that will surely push me forward as I strive to catch up to everyone else. Today was my first practice, being 2 years out of practice hasnt hindered me as much as I had thought it would, but I swear I havent been in this sore in a long time. The coach has me scheduled for my first meet this weekend. Track Meet's are something I miss hugely, Imagine an MLG event except there are hundreds of athlete's instead of hundreds of nerds, and everyone's there to compete.



As for starcraft, I'm currently a member of the complexity academy. It has its ups and downs. I plan on seeing where this WCS stuff ends up going and whether or not I stand a chance of making some form of notable run.



edit: some minor info added



Oh man.... I haven't done a blog in forever. But I was going through my day thinking about all the stuff going on in my life. And then I realized that I had no one around who cared enough to actually listen to it all. I figure people have seen my stream, have seen my thousands of posts on /r/starcraft and TL, and may have even see me play in a casted match or two. But nobody really knows who I am. So I decided that I wanted to write a blog about it. But then I got home with some boneless spare ribs and pork fried rice and thought "fuck that shit, i'll do it later"Anyway, later has come, I suppose I'll write it now...... (got samurai jack running on the other side of my monitor) + Show Spoiler + Since this is my first real blog, let me give a little background info about myself. I am a 21 Year old college student name Marcus Bazan who plays Starcraft 2 competitively since the games launch in 2010. I am a grandmaster Protoss player who has played mostly under "AGIANTSMURF", but also under the I.D. "Carbon", throughout the HotS beta I played under the ID "[JLA]TheBatman" I am currently playing under the ID "[coLcad]MLBazan". Prior to Starcraft, I wasn't big into RTS games. I played WC3 on occasion (Vamps, battleships, and Hungry Hungry Fel Hound ALL DAYYYYY) but for the most part I was a console gamer (COD 4 on PS3) Throughout highschool however I played very little video games as I participated in numerous afterschool activities (Chess club, Basketball team, Track Team). While at the time basketball was my passion, Track and Field was what I excelled at. Both my Junior and Senior year I qualified for the New York State Championships for the Triple Jump, each year placing 11th in my division. I was good enough to jump for a Division I or Division II school and started to think about the posibilities. In the end I decided on attending a Division III school with a stronger academic system as I realized that I would have likely been miserable at the Division I school I was speaking with. (I do not regret this decision)Highschool me + Show Spoiler + Fast forward a bit and I'm a freshman in college. The athletics program sucks balls but the engineering program is really good. Unfortunately I got caught up in the college life, In the middle of NYC too. I was notorious in highschool for having a sense of urgency and always putting stuff off to the last minute, something that still haunts me today. I got through highschool slacking off to the maximum and putting in as little effort as possible, but still managing B's. During my second year, SC2 is released. I had previously decided I wasn't going to buy it, not being that into the original. But the good reviews combined with my impulsiveness leads to me buying the game despite only having a 2009 13' MBP to play on. Starting out in Silver League with very little competitive RTS experience, I became immediately hooked with the ladder system. After deciding I wanted to take SC2 more seriously, I built my own desktop. Towards the end of my 2nd year I find myself as being completely Unable to pass one of the core classes in the engineering program, and after my 2nd year I'm forced out of the program. I take a semester off to re-evaluate my life. Obviously due to my academic situation, I am ineligible to run track starting in late winter 2010/2011COLLEGE!!! + Show Spoiler + This is the summer/fall/winter of 2011, Im doing literally nothing but SC2 and mooching off my awesome parents. During this time I see myself improve drastically going from low master's to high masters and eventually facing people like Idra, Grubby and even stephano on ladder. This is when I start to believe I could potentially become a professional SC2 player. I attend MLG providence with a group of friends. I get matched against (then Vile) Illusion and lose 1-2 in a series of me defending 1-1-1's. Game 3 comes down to him hellion dropping me while I warp dt's into his main via hallucination pylon. Unfortunately he does much more damage and I take the loss. I knock out some people in the Loser's bracket before going down in a PvP to WazSkynet. It was at this tournament that I joined up with team cvg alongside puCK, Fitzyhere, Sasquatch, Yata, kiom, kyo, alexcmoi, and others.Early winter 2012 arrives and I decide its time to go back to school having done almost nothing for the last 7 months. I re-enter the same school as a part time student. Still playing SC2 but progressing a little slower than before, I also find a job so that my parents stop yelling at me. This time is different however and I finish the semester with a 3.5 GPA, Summer comes and I go back to just work + SC2. In june I roadtrip out with Pokebunny, and caster Schamtoo on a trip to MA for the NESC2 finals. My tournament run is brief as a 4th friend spills water on my keyboard and mouse, sabotaging my run. We drive back with Pokebunny having won 650$, We make him treat us to mcdonalds at 1am on the drive back. In September Just before classes start and just before the HotS beta is launched, I am promoted into GM!!! Fall semester starts up again and I am once more a Full Time student. Balancing the HotS beta + School proves challenging But I'm still able to pull of a 3.4 GPA while maintaining my GM status on both WoL and HotS beta. During this time, My track coach from college contacts me attempting to get me back on the team. Im not interested as I'm finally having success in both school and mildly in starcraft. Winter comes and goes, HotS launches.After spending the last 2 years of my life basically doing nothing but school and starcraft, I decided very recently that I was tired of being out of shape (im not fat or even remotely close to being overweight. I just no longer have any stamina/endurance). Tired of being tired, and really just annoyed that I could no longer run up 3 floors of stairs without being out of breath. When I go home I step on a scale and see myself as actually having lost weight despite sitting on my ass for the last 2 yrs. My track coach contacts me once more informing me on how they could use my help on the roster. This time however I decide its time to get back in shape. Knowing that I wont do it on my own (even though I have a gym membership, lawl) I figure getting back into track will do more than motivate me, it will force me back into shape and increase my overall health condition. Not only that, but in my absence the track team has become notable. They've won their regional championships 2 years running and have several respectable athlete's. This is something that will surely push me forward as I strive to catch up to everyone else. Today was my first practice, being 2 years out of practice hasnt hindered me as much as I had thought it would, but I swear I havent been in this sore in a long time. The coach has me scheduled for my first meet this weekend. Track Meet's are something I miss hugely, Imagine an MLG event except there are hundreds of athlete's instead of hundreds of nerds, and everyone's there to compete.As for starcraft, I'm currently a member of the complexity academy. It has its ups and downs. I plan on seeing where this WCS stuff ends up going and whether or not I stand a chance of making some form of notable run.edit: some minor info added Thats "Grand-Master" SMURF to you.....