Who is the most underrated player ever?

That’s a really difficult question for us to answer, because as soon as we put a name out there, they’re kind of… no longer underrated? They’ve finally got that recognition. It’s a phenomenon known as the ‘Michael Carrick paradox’.

Well, it’s not, but it should be. He was a very good footballer who was pretty underrated for a long time, but then one year every journalist demanded he win the player of the season and wouldn’t shut up about how underrated he was, until he was, hilariously, slightly overrated.

Anyway, we don’t have a definitive answer, but RUSH has to be up there. He was a workhorse player who made everyone around him better, and there’s a reason that two of the only good NA teams ever had him on it.

Sadly, his impressively decorated career - by NA standards - has come to a close this week, so we thought he’d make a perfect candidate for First Game/Last Game.

His career almost went in reverse, in a sense; his first game ever saw him go pretty horrendously negative (44-61), 3-8 in opening duels and finishing on a 0.77 rating. In his defence, he was playing against titans of the game like freakazoid, mOE, ShahZaM and… clown?

Alright, you might have detected a hint of sarcasm on the word ‘titans’ there, but that’s actually a pretty tough game for a new kid in 2013. RUSH actually did go positive on map two, which his team MonoManiac won, with a 1.11 rating and a 23-20 scoreline on Season.

Yes, really.

They got smacked on Inferno though, with RUSH stinking up the place, and freakazoid going absolutely crazy. 28-13! 1.95! It’s easy to forget that he wasn’t always a meme.

That whole ‘going in reverse’ thing? Instead of getting washed, RUSH actually ended his career doing a hell of a lot better than he started. He dropped a 1.20 against Marsborne for Nouns, finishing his career as a reliable, middle-of-the-pack guy that he was when he won the Major.

Now that’s consistency. He was the third highest rated player on his team in his first game, his last game and at the Boston Major in 2018.

Most underrated ever? Maybe not. But history will definitely be kind to RUSH. Enjoy your retirement, boss.