Smasher:ProtoBanham

ProtoBanham is a Super Smash Bros. Ultimate  and  main from Japan who formerly used. He is considered the best Min Min and Lucina player in the world when he was active, and one of the best Inkling players in the world before dropping her. ProtoBanham is currently ranked 2nd on the Experimental Smash Player Rankings and 7th on the OrionRank 2022; he is also currently an honorable mention on the LumiRank 2023 Top 100 due to low activity, and was also ranked 10th on the discontinued Japan Player Rankings.

ProtoBanham won his first major at in 2021 using Lucina and Min Min. Throughout the year, ProtoBanham was often considered to be the best player in Japan, finishing in 1st place at, , , and. Although in the following year he had lost the title to due to weaker performances in Japan, he turned it around with his stellar performances overseas, with a 3rd place finish at, where he defeated many top players in the loser's bracket, including  and , and victories at  and , defeating Leo twice in the former as well as  and  in the latter.

In, ProtoBanham was a main. He had set wins over the likes of, , and.

On January 5th, 2021, ProtoBanham joined the newly founded Japanese organization (Vrilliant Owl X at the time) as their first Smash player, along.

Playstyle
With both Lucina and Min Min, ProtoBanham is known for being extremely aggressive and utilizing an excellent advantage state. He uses Lucina's Dolphin Slash's intangibility during the beginning frames and fast startup to escape combos as well as an edgeguard (by hitting recovering opponents towards the ledge). He is well known for his Shield Breaker mix-ups, often catching opponents off-guard. ProtoBanham is famous for his incredible movement with Lucina, in particular being the only top player to heavily utlize wavelanding into his neutral game.

With Min Min, ProtoBanham utilizes her large hitboxes to accumulate damage by ledgetrapping and suppressing his opponent in neutral with the Ramram and Dragon. He is also known to go off-stage with Mega-Watt to finish off a stock, as well as using her up special to hit opponents above him and keep them in disadvantage.

A notable aspect of ProtoBanham is his unique creativity in both his playstyle and his gameplans. An example of this was during EVO 2019, where when grabbing his opponent, instead of the typical throws, he would instead grab release, opting for better positioning due to Lucina's lackluster throws. Another aspect of this is his counterplay game: he is well-known for switching his characters against his opponent even when winning games, either to switch up the tempo of his opponent or heavily utilize stage advantage.

Trivia

 * ProtoBanham's signature look is his baseball cap. He wore a Le Coq Sportif cap in every major tournament pre-quarantine. Fanarts depicting Proto consisted of Lucina wearing this cap.
 * After the quarantine and his signing to Team Vrillant, he changed it in favor of a cap from his new sponsor. He also switched when he joined Crazy Raccoon.
 * ProtoBanham was able to place 5th at despite suffering from kidney stones. However he dropped out of  to have treatment.
 * Proto is one of five players to win an Ultimate major while being seeded outside of the top 16 (Kagaribi 4 as the 25th seed), alongside (won Umebura SP 6 as the 37th seed),  (won Let's Make Big Moves 2022 as the 32nd seed),  (won  as the 57th seed), and  (won  as the 17th seed)..
 * ProtoBanham was dubbed "The Iceman" by the community as he is often known to ice his opponents. However, ProtoBanham's "icing" is mainly due to his kidney stones, where drinking copious amounts of water is recommended.

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate

 * EGS Cup #3 Winners Quarters - Zackray (R.O.B.) vs. ProtoBanham (Lucina)
 * EVO 2019 Losers Top 8 - Light (Fox) vs. ProtoBanham (Lucina)
 * Smash Ultimate Summit 4 Losers Semi-Finals - MkLeo (Pyra/Mythra) vs ProtoBanham (Min Min, Lucina)
 * Smash Ultimate Summit 5 Winners Quarters - Sparg0 (Cloud) vs ProtoBanham (Min Min, Lucina)