Magic: The Gathering: 10 Most Powerful Mono-Blue Cards In 2020 Standard
7. Neutralize
Blue cards don't always need to be complex to have a roll in a deck. Sometimes they can be swiss army knives and have different modes to have different solutions to all kinds of different problems. Other times they can be a scalpel filling just the right need in a certain deck; that's where Neutralize comes in.
With the release of Ikoria we've seen the cycling ability come back into favour in standard. If you aren't familiar cycling lets you pay the cycling cost on the card in order to discard that card and draw another at instant speed. Finding a spot in control decks and the upcoming cycling deck that is beginning to make an appearance in standard Neutralize lets you counter target spell for one generic mana and two blue but it also cycles itself for two generic mana. Your opponent might play something on their turn? Hold up Neutralize. They didn't? Cycle it.
When a seemingly simply card can have multiple roles in a deck it's time to re-asses its status as a "simple card". Neutralize has found its place in standard and it is here to stay.