Arbaro's Rankings for the September 2024 Premiere Poll

August saw a lot of new faces and rising stars qualing into the Masters Event and beginning to build a resume to break into the top 25. While the rankings have stabilized a bit in the past few months, there are plenty of players eager to shake things up and make a name for themselves.

Numbers in parentheses refer to the (Premiere Poll ranking | my ranking) for August. NR stands for "Not Ranked". If you're a Premiere Pollster and want to share your reasoning for your rankings on this blog, or if you're a reader who just wants to pitch in your two cents, feel free to join our Discord.

1 ALEX THACH (1 | 1)
A high-level player might be able to get one game off of Alex, but if you're waiting on him to slip up three times, you'll be waiting for a while. The world champ has the chance to make history once the August finals bracket for Masters is played -- no one has ever won four in a row before.

2 BLUE SCUTI (2 | 2)
Scuti's CTL title defense is going smoothly so far, finishing 7-1 on the regular season and only getting knocked out of first place by a tiebreaker. He's made it to the CTM semifinals again, too, putting up a 1.8 in his win against Myles.

3 DOG (3 | 3)
Sidnev has had Dog's number this month. She swept him in CTL in spite of Dog's 1.5, and she had to hit the 1.5 mark three times to take their CTM match in a decider. Otherwise, though, it's been smooth sailing for the two-time world champion, finishing eight points clear of second place in his CTL div.

4 TRISTOP (4 | 5)
Tristop continues to build on his CTWC success, taking the trophy home from the high-profile Montreal regional and eeking out the top spot of a very competitive CTL division.

5 MYLES (7 | 6)
Myles' 29 play has progressed to the point where victories against people outside of the top ten feel almost inevitable. His only two losses this month came at the hands of Scuti, and even then, he made Scuti work hard for them.

6 SIDNEV (5 | 4)
Sidnev dropping two spots has more to do with the top getting more crowded than anything she might have done. Throughout all of 2024, she's either made the semifinals or lost to the evental winner of CTM. Consistency remains an issue, but the trendlines seem to be pointing in the right direction.

7 THEDENGLER (7 | 7)
Noah's CTM Orange Bracket victory was, unsurprisingly, driven in large part by outstanding 18 play. He didn't let go of the gas in post, either, hitting 1.2 into 29 in four out of eight games between the two sets.

8 NEK0 (22 | 19)
Neko's been gaining steam for quite some time, but he truly broke out in August after going toe-to-toe with Myles in CTM and making the CTL playoffs on his second attempt. It's easy to imagine him becoming a permanent fixture near the top of this list.

9 GERALD FREEMAN (6 | 7)
Crickets from Gerald this month, and as of midday August 31 he hasn't qualed for Semptember CTM, either. Hopefully he'll be back in action soon.

10 IBALL (10 | 11)
Early topouts remain a pressing concern for iBall -- a lost against Koster meant a losing record for his CTL season -- but the sheer number of huge scores he's putting up is becoming impossible to ignore.

11 FRACTAL (9 | 12)
Fractal's reentry into the non-DAS side of competitive Tetris went about as well as he could hope after winning a very competitive Minneapolis regional. Therre's clearly some rust when it comes to his rolling, but once he gets back into the swing of things, he's going to get real scary real quick.

12 DANV (11 | 9)
DanV occasionally gets in a slump in comp play, but even his slumps aren't that bad. He was able to push SV to a decider in the CTUK semifinals and make it to the finals of the most competitive Challengers bracket there's ever been, though he didn't exactly put his best foot forward once he got there. A 6-2 CTL season ain't too shabby, either.

13 SODIUM (15 | 13)
Sodium had a strong showing in two regionals this month, only getting bounced by Tristop and iBall in Ohio and Montreal, respectively. He was thrown out of Challengers early by eventual champion Rhubarb, but that's forgivable. His 4-4 CTL season was even good enough to sneak into the playoffs.

14 SVNESTRIS (16 | 17)
SV dirty-tetrised his way into the CTUK championship this month, building anticipation for his return to CTM in September.

15 TOMMYNTG (13 | 10)
We finally got more than one match from Tommy this month as he squeaked past Rah in a decider to make it into the second round of CTM. He had a great 1.3 game, a couple early topouts, and a bunch of solid-but-not-spectacular games. It puts him on par with the other players in this neighborhood of the rankings, though the suspision that he's be higher if there was a larger body of games to judge him by still lingers.

16 HUFFULUFUGUS (14 | 15)
Huff had a couple strong performances in regional tournaments this month, making it to the finals in Ohio and pushing eventual champion Fractal to a decider in a fun matchup in Minneapolis. Both runs had a couple shaky moments, but it's something to build off of.

17 PORTALLL (19 | 14)
At his best, Portal can break records and keep up with almost anyone. At his worst, he can struggle to make it to 19. Regardless, he's one of the most entertaining players to watch, and if he can learn to maintain aggressive pace while limiting early topouts, he'll put the rest of the players on this list on notice.

18 RAHMATIONS (17 | 18)
Somthing hasn't quite been clicking for Rah; he's still putting up plenty of 1.2's and 1.3's, but he's giving up too many early topouts, and the pieces aren't quite getting where he wants them to go after 29. Hopefully he'll be able to iron out the wrinkles and get back to challenging for a top ten spot.

19 DAVIDMJ (20 | 24)
DMJ had another solid set against Sidnev in CTM this month, and his BO3 loss against a rapidly improving Meme in Kansas City is forgivable.

20 LAZER (23 | 22)
Lazer played a great set against Dengler in CTM this month, even putting together a 1.4 to take a game off of him.

21 COBRA (25 | NR)
Cobra's 29 is improving by leaps and bounds lately, but he still gets most of his wins by playing well before the killscreen. He's proven that he can take games or even matches off of top-ten opponents, and his name is popping up in the later rounds of brackets increasingly often as a result.

22 ALLENBOT (21 | 20)
Despite having a couple solid games, Allenbot was bounced out of CTM by Tristop in the first round for a second month in a row.

23 CHEEZ (18 | 21)
Cheez made it to the finals of the Minneapolis regional, and though he was clearly exhausted by that point and didn't play his best, the potential was still evident.

24 VICIOUS RHUBARB (NR | NR)
In the most competitive Challengers Circuit bracket of all time, it was Rhubarb who made a statement by taking home the Free Forty Characters trophy. He did it in the midst of a busy travel calendar, having a solid showing at all three regional tournaments he attended and providing further evidence that he's getting back on track.

25 COALBUCKET (24 | 23)
Coal had a bit of a down month, making an early exit from Challengers at the hands of Cobra and finishing 2-6 in his CTL season. He does have some positives to build on, though: three of those losses came in deciders, and he avoided a playoff relegation in an increasingly competitive top flight.

FIRST FIVE OUT: OPAUX, TUGI, MEME, SUNNY, TIMMYKIM