I wouldn't be surprised if they were trying to get a fresh start after the way this year has gone, so it wouldn't be shocking if he wasn't.

I don't remember the exact quote, but that would have been Immortals. Teams like C9 in London and EnVyUs in Dallas won't have places to play yet and need more than a few months to build it.

It is true that many sports leagues have survived just fine without much, if any, loss in popularity during its dynasties. Maybe I am overthinking that, after all, the Korean World Cup matches still brought some of the largest viewership despite people expecting the stomps that the games were.

As for this issue as a whole, though, really we can only wait to see how everything works out. This is the most invested I've ever been in a brand new sports league with such lofty goals, so it will be exciting to watch what exactly happens and how people will react to it. I wonder if this is how North American soccer fans felt when the MLS was starting up, watching the creation of a new league in a modern setting in which international players were bound to be the keys to victory for the franchises involved?

I don't think it's fair to describe the league as NA. While the developer is American and the league will certainly be NA-centric, everything that Blizzard has told us about the Overwatch League so far is that they envision a truly global league. The opening matches will be played in America and the majority of the teams are American (although they may shoot to make that only a plurality down the road, who knows!), but I believe Blizzard hopes to cater the league to an international audience. There is a lot of money that can be made from attracting the eyes of a nation as large as China and from a nation as esports hungry as Korea.

I do think you're right that it isn't as appealing to a casual viewer for a Korean on Korean matchup to happen, however. I also think it's equally detrimental if a team seems to dominate a league in its infancy, too. While APEX isn't the ideal conditions for a visiting Western team and we don't know how Rogue and EnVyUs matchup to the top of Korea on a more level playing field, we do know for certain that Kongdoo Panthera is capable of defeating Lunatic-Hai and their matches are almost always close. I do think it's important to have Kongdoo Panthera representing someone in the league to ensure that there is a competitive final (not saying a western team doesn't exist or can't be built to compete with LH, I am just saying that KDP is closer to a concrete guarantee of being a competitor to them).

In this sense, KR vs KR isn't too bad. We know that there will be rosters that will be mostly western and all-western existing in the first season of OWL. It is very likely Seagull will be on one of these rosters, and a lot more casual fans will watch when he does play like they do now. I imagine seeing a team defeat his, and that team's players specifically outplaying him, will pique the interest in a lot of those fans before a match between those two Korean teams ever takes place. I might just be overly optimistic, but I do believe that once fans are exposed to watching insane players play at a high skill level, they will be more interested in watching those players regardless of nationality. Although I might be reiterating what KuroiRyuu already said. If I am, I want to make it clear that I don't mean the OWL should be made up entirely of all-Korean rosters, anything more than 4 would definitely not look great and even that number is pushing it. Two to three is alright.

While I think owners will end up bringing more than just two all-Korean teams in their efforts to win right off the bat, as C9 looking for six Korean players seems to suggest, I don't want to see the league dominated by Koreans. Just as much as having only American franchises right off the bat would go against the vision of a global league, having one nationality dominating the playerbase of the league does the same thing. While I think it's not as detrimental in the first year as it would be once the teams actually move out of Los Angeles, I still think it has some detriment. Like Sideshow said, building a team off of Korean free agents would be really difficult, and if C9 does end up bringing in 6 Koreans to play for their team, I hope they struggle. Not out of malice, but as a way to show Koreans are beatable to casual fans.

In an ideal world, I think rosters composed in a similar way to that of Immortals or EnVyUs is best. Mixed nationality teams seem like they should be the natural conclusion for owners when it's a global league taking from the global playerbase. The teams should be trying to create chemistry with the best talent from around the globe. Of course language barriers get in the way of this, but hopefully that becomes less of a factor for eastern players that may spend a large amount of time in America for the opening seasons of the Overwatch League.

We also have to keep in mind that teams won't be playing in their home region right away, they will be spending a season or two in Los Angeles. Without needing to sell tickets to a local audience just yet, the Overwatch League will be hoping to establish itself as the top-level of Overwatch competition while teams will be hoping to brand themselves as dynasties. If the Overwatch League takes from the top of APEX, APEX can serve a role as the Contenders of Korea rather than a direct competitor to Overwatch League. If a team is able to establish itself as the best team in Overwatch before it moves to its home area, it has already built a national/international brand. All of the American sports teams with large fanbases that disregard geography, with the exception of the Cubs (they had a large, national fanbase even before winning the World Series last year), either experience championship, dynasty-like success recently or historically. Despite the Cowboys or Bulls not even going to a Super Bowl or NBA Finals in 20 years, each team is among the most popular in their respective league.

Additionally, players will only be signing one year contracts in the first season. Only one team can win a title, and only two teams can go to the grand finals/championship in any given season. Once a team realizes during these first two seasons that their Koreans aren't enough to compete with another team's group of Koreans, they will likely begin building a team they not only believe can compete, but also is going to be more friendly to there locality. If you can't win, you build your brand with marketable players.

While I believe teams ultimately should have some sense of locality in their rosters, I don't think it's necessarily vital in the initial seasons. I think it's to be expected that the league will start with a large number of Koreans and once the number of teams increases, the level of competition internationally increases, and teams begin actually moving to home, OWL teams will naturally begin fielding players more local to their base of operations.

I'm sorry if it seemed I was bouncing around a lot there, but I had a lot of points I wanted to make sure I at least included.

In saying this all, I hope C9 doesn't end up having more than a few Koreans on the team. I just think owners will focus more on building winning teams the first couple of seasons than building marketable teams.

This is true, but the League itself cannot control the rosters of its teams. While the owners can control this, once one team outside of Seoul has a team of Koreans, other owners will want to do the same so they can have a chance to win. No one is going to want to sacrifice their team's success for the good of the league as a whole. While ideally you want a league with a sense of locality within its teams, in reality it becomes hard to enforce in a competitive league.

If Overwatch fans are like traditional sports fans, then it won't matter where the players come from as long as they make the team good and bring success to their city. I can't say for sure Overwatch fans would be like that, but it's hard to imagine people not supporting the OWL champion simply because the roster is foreign. Just look at how Americans cheer for Envy despite not a single player being American.

libalent take my energy

there is always next season for FatCat

To add further context to what Admirable said, they are playing the first season or two in LA to give teams time to build infrastructure for hosting matches back at their home cities.

this has been done before smh noob writer
https://www.over.gg/3934/nesh-hammers-out-a-deal

ChrisTFer EnVisions a successful trial during their first week of Contenders

someone revived this with spam
while the spam was deleted, the thread remained in recent discussions

baltic flags hype

new logo PogChamp

This match page is brought to you by EnVision eSports! Don't forget to click the banners on the side for your chance to win!

should we really be defining the roles traditionally?
what about:
user-
user-
shitposter-
shitposter-
admin/mod/writer-
flex- (any of these roles or a pro who uses the site)

you'd have to have an older, beta god team and a newer up and coming team
skytrix and guinea don't appear as often as they used to but they are established shitposting veterans who should at least get tryouts for such a team

also the mkers title was admirable's
i was too busy reading the team name as "em-kayers" to create such a brilliant title
i still have a lot to learn in the art of punsmanship

half of my titles aren't even my own because they are changed for being too pun or not enough pun
my favorite of the ones that didn't make it was "Geguri finds her porpoise with ROX Orcas"

What Alicus has done is impressive. Correct me if my timeline is wrong, but Laser Kittenz was only formed a week or two before PIT in March. That means in less than half a year he got himself, and the team he built, into OWL, even if it's not under the Laser Kittenz name.

if geguri doesn't play i cry

that's the spirit

it depends on the quality of state flag, some states have really ugly flags and some states have really good flags

GO WALES

USA USA USA

the welsh flag

i don't think there is any user on this website as beloved as poi98

Don't forget EnVision eSports is giving away a GTX 1080 this summer! Click on either side of the page to enter a chance to win yours!

That was the play I was thinking of. While I understand their desire for an all-Swedish team, I still couldn't believe they would let a player like that go

When I think of Hidan, I think of those clutch sleep darts on Hollywood at the Overwatch Open. He has been one of my favorite supports ever since, and I hope to see him playing in OWL.

"Yes, all ultimates should drain instantly instead of over 0.25s."
This isn't a fact, it's an opinion and is also a focal point of the article. The other main point of the article, "ultimates should drain immediately rather than after the cast, with some exceptions," is also an opinion. His opinion in this piece offers a solution to players, specifically ryujehong in this case, being punished for shutting down ultimates too well. I think this counts as an editorial.

i share your pain

why has this tournament not been renamed to "Vivi's Invitational"

i took like 5 minutes to read sideshow's NiP article after map one and the game ended before i came back wtf

This is a really good read, takes me back to how exciting Overwatch Open games were to watch. Can't wait to read the rest!

WE'RE ON THE BOARD BOYS

ez for boom

As unlikely as it is, I'd like either Russia or Canada to upset Korea because I want to see both of them make Blizzcon.

finnish esports has been dead ever since SKYTRiXSHA stopped playing for ence

are you saying that isn't a russian flag but just a blue and red one

boom take my energy

obviously i need to spend more time proofreading than i currently do

i want fatcat to rise through the ranks of korea

new russian insider kuroiryuu9625 PogChamp

I think having time together to develop synergy is a little overrated. It matters, and it matters quite a bit, but I doubt it will matter to the point that a team with a talent disadvantage like Reds have here will be able to overcome Netherlands. Team Japan came from 3 to 4 different teams and took Blank to 5 maps. Spain, who only recently had gotten to practice with HarryHook because of Apex, took out a Finland squad made up of 5/6ths RiP (Taimou also recently got back, but the rest of his team should have had more synergy than Spain's team). Synergy and playtime together matters, but shouldn't matter more than raw talent.

Also I'm hoping it takes a couple weeks for any deals to go through (besides the Immortals players signing with the team they already have) because I imagine it won't look too appealing for investors to join in if the cream of the crop is already taken.

i'll cowrite it

They've announced plans to add more but to my knowledge it isn't guaranteed.

also pixelfish i'm just supporting the estonian world cup team