Call of Duty League 2021 preview: Part I

It’s safe to say the first season of the freshly franchised Call of Duty League did not go as planned. After a kickoff event in Minnesota in January 2020, the league traveled to London, Atlanta and Los Angeles for the first few home series. Then the COVID-19 pandemic began, and the league took a month-long hiatus to figure out how to proceed before moving the rest of the year’s competitions online.

Despite some technical hiccups when play resumed online, the league finished out the season and crowned a champion, the Dallas Empire. With the 2021 season set to begin Thursday, here are some of the most significant things to watch this year.

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The haves and the have-nots

There was a clear divide in the CDL’s first year between the haves and the have-nots when it came to fans.

The Chicago Huntsmen, Atlanta FaZe and Dallas Empire had no trouble attracting fans because of their prior histories with Call of Duty esports, but other organizations had to build brands from scratch.

Some of those orgs, like Version1’s (formerly Wise Venture Esports) Minnesota ROKKR and Andbox’s New York Subliners, have made solid progress since last year. Other brands, like Kroenke Sports and Entertainment’s Los Angeles Guerrillas and Enthusiast Gaming’s Seattle Surge have not been nearly as successful. The combination of not being able to connect with local audiences via in-person events and poor performances last season mean these two teams face uphill battles attracting fans.

One season is not enough to judge a team of course. With success this year, any team can find itself becoming fan favorites as the year goes on. But in 2021, the lesser-known brands will have another team steeped in Call of Duty history to compete with.

The return of 100 Thieves and H3CZ’s reunion with OpTic

After Hector “H3CZ” Rodriguez, the longtime CEO of OpTic Gaming, was forced to sell his brand to the Immortals Gaming Club in June 2019, a fight began for the Green Wall, the nickname given to one of the most rabid fan bases in all of esports. The Green Wall was an incredibly valuable asset in the first year of the CDL. On one side was Immortals Gaming Club’s OpTic Gaming Los Angeles, and on the other was the Chicago Huntsmen, a team backed by NRG that brought on H3CZ as co-CEO.

As soon as the season started, it was clear H3CZ carried the Green Wall with him, and OGLA had missed out on having a built-in fan base. This offseason, IGC sold the OpTic brand back to H3CZ (who immediately re-branded the Chicago Huntsmen to OpTic Chicago) and the spot in the CDL to 100 Thieves who will be known as the Los Angeles Thieves.

100T founder and CEO Matthew “Nadeshot” Haag became famous playing Call of Duty for OpTic Gaming a decade ago. Now, his team is taking the vacated spot from the shell of OpTic. It’s poetic.

There are a few possible options for how the LA Thieves impact the CDL. Given Nadeshot’s background with OpTic, they might split the Green Wall with OpTic Chicago. As a leading merchandise, fashion and culture brand, LA Thieves could immediately become massive fan favorites without needing to poach OpTic’s fan base. (They already have more Twitter followers than every CDL team besides OpTic Chicago.)

It might also be the case the addition of LA Thieves is a rising tide that raises all boats in the league by virtue of the new viewers they bring in. Besides the Los Angeles Guerrillas, who have been relegated to Clipper-status in the city of LA, most other teams are probably pretty happy to have LA Thieves on board.

Structural changes

The most notable change is the move from 5v5 to 4v4. The switch to 5v5 actually happened the year before the CDL, but for most of CoD’s decade-long history, the top esports competitions were held in 4v4.

In general, 4v4 allows for one player to be more important, makes matches easier to follow for casual fans and slows the game down, thus making tactical decisions crucial.

It also cuts twelve starters from the league, meaning just 48 people in total will be starters in the CDL this year. Given that there are no longer massive open qualifiers like in the CDL’s predecessor — the Call of Duty World League — it’s even harder for aspiring pros to break into the top level from a lower-tier team.

Like the move back to 4v4, the schedule itself is also taking a page from CoD’s past. Ahead of the 2020 season, Activision Blizzard made a last-second decision to change league play into a tournament-based format centered around Home Series.

For 2021, Activision Blizzard is changing it yet again — this time breaking the season up into stages and adding more tournaments. Home Series will still be mini-tournaments that award teams points for the overall standings, but Major tournaments, which take place after every three Home Series, will be the main way to stay on top of the standings.

Check back tomorrow for Part II of our Call of Duty League 2021 season preview.

Lead image credit: Activision Blizzard