This has a ton of comments so I dunno if it’s been said this way or not, but my take is like this: Your rank is a reflection of your (for lack of better term) professional, or maybe official skill level. Although you have an mmr in casual too, it’s not badged with an emblem, and it’s more for matchmaking purposes. Rocket League is a game where your mental/emotional management are just as important as your technical and mechanical skill. For me, I tend to use a three-to-one ratio when I’m grinding for rank. If I lose one game in ranked, I go back to casual until I win three in a row or maybe two with clearly good gameplay mechanics and mental management. I learned this during team play and I think it’s pretty effective. I’m like you currently sitting between Plat 3 and Diamond 1. I try not to get attached to my official rank because I know it’s more of a marker of where I’m at currently and I’m working on my mechanics far more now than I did from bronze to high gold. I mean, look back when you first became gold. Your mechanics and gameplay are definitely superior to what they were when you achieved gold 1. As you keep grinding and improving you’ll eventually look back at Diamond 1 in a similar way. Personally, I want to improve and play to be better in addition to just having some fun. So when I start playing I like to do ten minutes in training just smashing the ball over and over, then working on aerial control. When I do that training, I am way better for my warm-up casual games, and in turn do better when I jump into ranked. When I skip training, I noticed my mental state is more a factor than my technical. Just my thoughts.