Was curious on what people's opinions on the Link matchup are?
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I've only fought what I'd call a good one once and it was a bit of a handful I wasn't expecting....
The Link would usually try to fill the air with his projectiles as I tried to approach. Getting in wasn't too hard, although annoying, but once I was close enough to attack I usually met Link's jab. Like Link's fsmash, it felt like the jab could be staggered and I failed a few times at shielding it. It also kept me back from him pretty well where I couldn't reach with any move safely. He also fsmashed where he'd swing once and hold off on his second waiting for me to shield drop or approach too early to get the second swing, or too late at which point I'd get the jab again. Retreating was punished with his nice dash attack, but I didn't do that too often and he didn't punish it but a couple times anyways, but it's effectiveness was memorable. Rolling behind him was often responded to with him utilting, usmashing, or inputing a ftilt toward me. He read me well admittedly and my trouble was more with the player than the character, but there's no doubting that Link has some nice tools.
My best approach option was usually dash into jump and dair between projectiles. Dair kept me above him better than nair which his jab could still reach a lot of times before it fully landed. His options against dair were just too slow for the most part other than shield. I failed to land bair a lot just by falling too fast or spacing poorly but I have to think it would be a good option if I didn't fail so bad with it in these matches, heh. My follow ups after getting that first hit were usually dash attack, and when the damage was good enough, uairs and other aerials. By the time I was popping him up well he'd punish aggressive uairing with his own dair, so I had to keep that in the back of my mind. I was disappointed that the times I baited him to dair that I couldn't seem to get a good punish in upon him landing. He also did well not to be gimped. Link's recovery is much much better than it's ever been I'd say.
Basically, he wasn't too bad, but he did beat me the majority of the time. I mostly blame myself doing something dumb towards the end of the match at the exact wrong moment for the loses, but he did capitalize well on my mistakes and read me quite well. And I read him less well and was disappointed I didn't punish him better, often from just inputting poorly or being positioned bad. Some more time with a good Link could swing to my advantage with enough practice and less mistakes. Just couldn't manage it well in a 5 or so round effort.
