Top 20 players of 2016: Introduction

As has been custom for seven years now (with the exception of the transitional 2012 which featured both CS:GO and CS 1.6) we begin the New Year by presenting our Top 20 players of 2016! We will publish one article per day starting from tonight all the way up to January 20th when we will reveal our #1 player.

You will be able to find the updated ranking on this page during the process, as well as the full list after it's all said and done like in the last year's edition.

Top 20 players of 2016 powered by EGB.com

1.	Marcelo "coldzera" David
2.	Gabriel "FalleN" Toledo
3.	Nicolai "device" Reedtz
4.	Aleksandr "s1mple" Kostyliev
5.	Janusz "Snax" Pogorzelski
6.	Richard "shox" Papillon
7.	Patrik "f0rest" Lindberg
8.	Olof "olofmeister" Kajbjer
9.	Adil "ScreaM" Benrlitom
10.	Robin "flusha" Rönnquist
11.	Nikola "NiKo" Kovač
12.	Egor "flamie" Vasilyev
13.	Kenny "kennyS" Schrub
14.	Emil "Magiskb0Y" Reif
15.	Fernando "fer" Alvarenga
16.	Markus "Kjaerbye" Kjaerbye
17.	Ladislav "GuardiaN" Kovács
18.	Christopher "GeT_RiGhT" Alesund
19.	Lincoln "fnx" Lau
20.	Dennis "dennis" Edman

Surpassing 2015 in number of big tournaments (this time there were 15 that we classified as such due to featuring many of the world's best teams and a $200,000+ prize pool), this past year will likely be remembered as the most competitive in CS to date in terms of different teams and players finding their place under the spotlight.

That naturally led to the biggest number of players yet making a very strong case for a place in this ranking, but as usual, we had to limit it to the 20 of the very best, leaving behind some rising stars, as well as frequent members of previous lists.

Big stages like this one forged the Top players of 2016

The ranking is as usual based on statistical parameters from LAN events (online performances are not counted), with big events carrying more weight due to providing tougher competition and bigger pressure to perform.

In 2016 we introduced some new stats to our database which helped us analyze performances even better, such as ADR (average damage per round), and we are in the process of introducing a few more such as KAST (rounds with a kill, assist, survival or a traded death, which measures round-to-round consistency) and Impact rating (value based on multi-kill rounds, opening kills and winning 1vsX situations), both of which will be included in our Rating 2.0 that is set to be added to the site during the first months of 2017. Those stats will be referenced throughout the article series as they were considered during the creation of the ranking.

We also determined the MVPs and EVPs (Exceptionally Valuable Players) for each of the 26 events considered for this ranking, extending back to the whole year beyond those that we handed out medals for, and those were valued more than just performing well at an event.

If you are one of our readers who attempts to guess the ranking, here are some clues – each of the 20 players attended at least five "Big" events, while 18 of them returned as winners from at least one of those. Although the year's two Majors weren't as highly regarded as in previous rankings due to there being so many other big events, 18 of our Top 20 players attended at least one out of MLG Columbus and ESL One Cologne.

The ranking is once again supported and powered by EGB.com, who are again a name partner only and not involved in deciding the list. Happy New Year to all of you and stay tuned over the next 20 days as we get warmed up for 2017's action!