The archetype is in Legacy. Let me now get Esper Blink cards and run the with/without Psychic Frog performance split.
The recent date window returned nothing. Let me expand the lookback window significantly to find sufficient data.
Interesting — there's an "esper frog" archetype and "esper midrange" which might contain Psychic Frog. Let me check which Esper archetypes actually run Psychic Frog in the main deck, and also run the with/without split across all Esper archetypes that play Ephemerate (the blink card).
So Esper Blink in the database maps most closely to "Esper Midrange" (which runs Ephemerate). Let me now run the with/without Psychic Frog split on Esper Midrange, and also check for any other blink-style esper decks.
Matches aren't resolving through that join — let me check the matches table structure by looking at how match data ties to entries.
Good, results are "WIN"/"LOSS"/"DRAW" (not W/L/D). Let me redo the with/without split with correct result values, now broadening to all Esper archetypes that run Ephemerate.
All 9 Ephemerate-running Esper entries have no Psychic Frog. Let me now broaden — look at ALL Esper archetypes in Legacy and do the with/without Frog split regardless of Ephemerate, then also check the "Esper Blink" archetype vs "Esper Frog" to understand what the DB categorizes.
Now I have clear data. Let me also check if this breakdown changes when filtering specifically to the Esper Midrange archetype (which has Ephemerate, making it the closest to "Esper Blink").
Now I have solid data across two lenses. Here's the answer:
Hey @deadkenneddies, great question. "Esper Blink" as a named archetype has barely any data in Legacy (just 1 entry), but the closest equivalent — Esper Midrange running Ephemerate as the blink engine — has 152 entries total and gives a clear answer: without Psychic Frog is better, and it's not particularly close.
Looking at Esper Midrange specifically (the archetype that runs Ephemerate), the without-Frog builds went 314-314 across 138 entries for an even 50.0% winrate (excluding mirrors). The 3 Esper Midrange entries that did run Psychic Frog in the main deck posted a dismal 5-11 record, just 31.3% — a brutal gap of nearly 19 points. The sample on the Frog-inclusive side is small, but the direction is unambiguous. Broadening to all Esper-named Legacy archetypes, Frog-less builds across 284 entries clock in at 49.0% vs 44.7% for the 31 Frog-running entries (98-121) — still a clear 4+ point deficit for the Frog versions.
The data suggests Psychic Frog is not a natural fit in Esper Blink-style shells. The archetype leans on value engines like Overlord of the Balemurk and Emperor of Bones looped with Ephemerate; Psychic Frog's discard-for-counters gameplan competes with rather than complements that hand-management strategy. If you want to run Frog in Esper, the data shows it tends to get categorized as its own archetype (Esper Frog, 14 entries) rather than slot into the blink shell.
Sources: Data drawn from 524 Legacy tournaments (56% MTGO, 43% Melee, 1% other) spanning April 2025 to March 2026. Recent events include:
https://www.mtgo.com/decklist/legacy-challenge-32-2026-03-0812834525
https://melee.gg/Decklist/View/e01f9d45-0efe-4324-a111-b40700d2e890
https://melee.gg/Decklist/View/1804e310-aaac-4617-96ba-b4070090dc11