Smasher:CaptainZack


 * Not to be confused with Smasher:CaptainJack.

CaptainZack is a former Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, , and player from New Orleans, Louisiana. He was considered the best Bayonetta player in the early metagame, achieving solid placements in competitive play despite her drastic nerfs from Smash 4. He was formerly ranked 32nd on the Spring 2019 PGRU and has wins over players such as, , , , , , , and.

In, he was initially a main, but found greater success after picking up. At one point, he was considered the best Bayonetta player in the world, but eventually faced a period of inconsistency that lasted for the rest of the game's active lifespan. CaptainZack was ranked 15th on the Panda Global Rankings 100 and was formerly ranked 2nd on the Louisiana Smash 4 Power Rankings.

He is known (and partly infamous) for his colourful personality, in and out of the game. He makes frequent usage of taunts, as well as dances, many of which come from the Bayonetta series itself.

On June 6th, 2017, CaptainZack was sponsored by, making him their second SSB4 player after , and third Smash player overall following. He would leave the team on May 17th, 2018. He would then be picked up by on March 13th, 2019, but would be dropped on August 2nd of the same year following a blackmail controversy. Since then, he has been embroiled in controversies surrounding his relationships with several adults while underaged, including with former professionals Nairo and Ally. Many of these relationships involved further blackmailing and extortion from CaptainZack, which eventually led to his ban from the competitive scene.

Before Bayonetta
In the early metagame of Smash 4, CaptainZack was a solo- player. Despite his young age, he quickly established himself as one of the strongest players in his region, where he consistently placed top 2 at local monthlies. Although he made a few appearances nationally, he still saw passable results, notably placing 33rd at and taking sets off of players such as  and.

Bayonetta's release
The results with Peach, however, would be no match to his later results. Following Bayonetta's release as a DLC character, CaptainZack, being a fan of the character, decided to pick her up. Although his first tournament with her,, ended in disappointment, he saw his first top 8 placement at a national at , where he defeated and , ultimately placing 4th. This placement, however, was overshadowed by his out-of-region breakout tournament at, where he upset to ultimately place 9th. This run, along with other fantastic placements such as 17th at and 7th at  and as subsequent wins over other top players such as  and, helped him debut at 20th place on the Panda Global Rankings v2.

Challenging Salem's title
Although CaptainZack had several high placements in the second season, they were no match for, who not only had better placements, including a few victories at smaller PGR tournaments, but notably double-eliminated at , among other top player victories. Ultimately, Salem was ranked 13th on the rankings, 7 places higher than CaptainZack, solidifying himself as the best Bayonetta player in the world.

However, in the third season, CaptainZack challenged Salem's title. CaptainZack started the season strong, placing 4th at, defeating , , and , as well as 5th at , defeating and. His best tournament run, however, was at, one of the most stacked tournaments in Smash 4 history, where he defeated kameme, , and , en route to a 4th place finish. His outstanding performance outshined Salem's initial results, who placed lower than CaptainZack at all three tournaments. Although Salem later caught up in the second half of the season, culminating in a 2nd place finish at, the damage was already done: by the end of the season, CaptainZack was ranked 7th, while Salem was ranked 4 places lower at 11th.

Losing steam
Despite having a strong third season overall, his challenge started to become questionable in the second half. Following 2GGC: Civil War, he failed to qualify for top 8 at a supermajor until the final supermajor of the season,. Furthermore, he saw several losses to unranked players such as, , and ; the latter loss started a struggle against mid- and low-tier characters such as.

While his outstanding first half and performance at CEO 2017 helped CaptainZack in the third season, he had no such help in the fourth season. He failed to qualify for top 8 at any supermajor during the season, and while he still had solid placements at regionals, they were unable to alleviate the damage done from the weaker national performances. Furthermore, he developed a bracket demon in, who had an 0-5 record against him by the end of the season. To top off the season, although CaptainZack qualified for the, he infamously lost to 's and ultimately went 1-2 in round robins to place 11th. Conversely, Salem had the best season of his Smash 4 career, where he not only saw consistent top 8 placements at supermajors, but even briefly challenged 's title for best player in the world by winning, , and. Due to Salem's sudden resurgence and CaptainZack's decline, Salem took back the title of best Bayonetta and was ranked 2nd by the end of the season, 16 places above CaptainZack's 18th.

A brief return to form
Although he had a rough fourth season, CaptainZack started to bounce back in the fifth season. Despite starting the season with a lukewarm 17th at with a notable loss to  player, CaptainZack saw his first national top 8 at , where he defeated  and ultimately placed 7th. From there, he only appeared at a couple PGR tournaments before ending off the season with top 8 placements at the two largest tournaments of the season: at, he eliminated and  to finish 5th, while at , he defeated Salem and  to place 4th. These two placements and top player wins alleviated a rather inactive season for CaptainZack and caused him to rise to 9th by the end of the season.

However, CaptainZack returned to inconsistency in the final season. Although he started off strong with a 2nd place finish at, the lack of seriousness he showcased during Grand Finals, which included a homie stock and holding Bullet Climax for two full minutes, seemed to have cursed his final few months. EVO 2018 was the last supermajor he placed in the top 8, and he saw some of his worst placements ever, including 49th at and 33rd at, with several losses to unranked players including , , and. These performances; the rise of other Bayonetta players such as, , and ; and Salem's consistency up until the game's final moments erased any chance for CaptainZack to reclaim the best Bayonetta title. Despite this weak conclusion, thanks to his outstanding third and fifth seasons, CaptainZack was ranked 15th on Panda Global's all-time Smash 4 rankings.

Reclaiming the title
As Ultimate rolled around, many people noted the severe nerfs received during the transition that hindered her KO power and notorious combo game. As a result, many of her best players, most notably and, dropped Bayonetta in favor of other characters. Despite the nerfs, CaptainZack continued to play Bayonetta, and placed 17th at and 49th at. These results, while decent, were nevertheless a far cry from CaptainZack's performance throughout most of Smash 4, which led to him picking up and her echo, which he saw several successful runs with, including 9th at , and the best wins of his season, including  and.

However, he maintained Bayonetta in his roster, and managed to pull off some success with Bayonetta, notably placing 17th at and 13th at, while using Bayonetta to help defeat players such as  and. With no other notable Bayonetta players seeing success that he saw, CaptainZack was considered the best Bayonetta player in the early metagame, reclaiming a title he had lost years ago, and was ranked 32nd on the Spring 2019 PGRU with Bayonetta as his first character.

A controversial career conclusion
The first season, however, was also the last time CaptainZack saw national success. Following a decent performance at, allegations of manipulation and blackmail surfaced, and many prominent tournament organizations banned CaptainZack from competing. Although he was allowed to spectate at, CaptainZack stopped entering tournaments and would be considered largely inactive. His only notable appearance since then was at the online tournament, where he entered under the tag "Secretary" and used mostly Bayonetta to place 17th. He would later return to the scene by attending Louisiana locals, consistently placing in the top 2, however following more manipulation allegations, he would be banned there as well. Since then, he has not made any appearance in the community.

Blackmailing/Bracket Manipulation
On August 2nd, 2019, around the time of Ally's controversy, a since-deactivated Twitter account going by the name of "The Truth" posted that CaptainZack pressured Ally into dating him, and that he blackmailed Ally into intentionally losing games to at  and  at. A few hours later, CaptainZack, in a Twitlonger, confirmed the rumors about manipulating Ally, and revealed more information about their relationship. He also stated that he was forcing Ally to drop games in hopes that Ally would leave him, and that he was getting more and more upset as Ally was able to have continued success. He was subsequently dropped by his team, Polar Ace, as a result of the incident.

Due to the incident, Zack was also banned from competing at. He was, however, allowed to attend as a spectator, and confirmed the decision on Twitter. also banned him from all 2GG tournaments on August 5th. 2GG notably organized both of the tournaments in which Zack admitted to manipulating brackets.

On January 16th, 2020, the SSBConductPanel released a statement where they advised an indefinite ban for CaptainZack with a chance to appeal after 5 years. This decision was met with significant backlash, with many players such as and  pointing out that  only had half of CaptainZack's sentencing for sexual harassment. The controversial ban was brought up again in late June 2020 amidst a number of bans on other Smashers, and the hashtag "UnbanCaptainZack" trended on Twitter. The SSBConductPanel released a statement on June 29th defending their decision, which caused more backlash as people noted that they did not go into the details of the decision. The panel later made another statement saying that they could not provide anything else because it involved private information. VGBootCamp made a post the following day saying that they were going to ignore the panel's ruling and only giving CaptainZack a one-year ban. This decision was also controversial, with people such as, who has seen the aforementioned private information, and , who was part of the panel's investigation on , disagreeing with the decision. On July 5, 2020, revealed text messages between Ally and CaptainZack confirming that CaptainZack threatened to expose Ally if he did not lose to Zackray, contradicting CaptainZack's opening Twitlonger statement.

Manipulated Claims on Nairo

 * Further information: Smasher:Nairo

On September 14th, 2020, several claims in CaptainZack's accusation of Nairo were brought into question when released a TwitLonger. In it, he claimed that Zack manipulated his TwitLonger on Nairo by filling it with lies; notably, he claimed that CaptainZack initiated the first sexual contact with Nairo, who was allegedly still asleep at that time. tamim also pointed out how Zack twisted the wording to make it look like Nairo was paying Zack hush money when it was, in fact, Zack who requested money from Nairo. Furthermore, tamim said that CaptainZack was "a very sneaky and devious person" and had attempted to seduce and manipulate several other adults besides Ally and Nairo. tamim also claimed that Zack wasn't worried about facing retribution for being in a relationship with Ally because he was a minor.

Two days later, CaptainZack would reach out to tamim where he confirmed a few things stated in tamim's TwitLonger, including asking Nairo for money and the minor excuse. tamim also stated that CaptainZack no longer planned to be part of the community. Despite this claim, CaptainZack continued to attend Louisiana locals until he was banned in October.

Trivia

 * While commentating at, CaptainZack revealed that his tag isn't a reference to as commonly thought. Instead, it originates from his usage of  in Brawl.
 * CaptainZack is also a very skilled Pokkén Tournament DX player, placing first at the PAX West 2017 Pokkén Tournament DX event. He plays Chandelure.
 * CaptainZack is famous for acting out 's taunts and dances during tournaments as shown at, , , and . This has since become controversial as many have stated that he does this to disrespect his competitors while others say he does it to represent his love for the Bayonetta franchise.