XL2 drops several in move to add New York locals

#1

blakku

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https://twitter.com/GoliathOW/status/1084242826655744000

https://twitter.com/Cloneman16/status/1084238712551071744

https://twitter.com/Mangachu_/status/1084233286296039424

#2

KuroiRyuu9625

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When having players of your region just isn't enough.

#3

ideekae

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imagine if the ny knicks d-league team got rid of half their team and replaced them with only new yorkers

#4

Wombat

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Truly baffling

#5

Frozello

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Wasn't Woohyal and Tizi signed before the date (was October 2018?) that allowed them to be excluded for Contenders Season 1 of 2019 region lock rule? So technically only Logix counts for region-lock at the moment?

However I am actually a little bit interested to see, what's the upcoming of this thing they are doing with local NYers. Mostly, because can they actually find a player(s) that haven't been noticed yet? Or is there some NY players already in some unsigned T2/T3 (Second Wind, First Generation or some Open Division?) teams?

Although thinking this on another perspective, if they wanted to change something dramatically in their team lineup now was probably the time. I always thought that Mangachu would be signed for OWL S2 (even more after I heard 2 teams in Canada), but I am not really capable to compare him to other players of his role that got into OWL S2 (well other than like 75% of them were probably Koreans, so dunno is that why he didn't get picked up /s). Think all 3 of them were Contenders worthy players at least.

As a team XL2 lineup was pretty decent, but since no one got picked up for OWL S2 (that's, what XL2 was probably counting on) it makes probably no sense to keep them for another year. But as western player is it really a good thing to be in XL2 or Britisth Hurricane, when their OWL teams are full Koreans? If some OWL team would really want you they would have to buyout for at least 50k. Oh course Academy team pays salaries and some other benefits, but it just makes me think sometimes would anyone actually join those Academies, if they could join another Academy team?

I don't know I just want to think reasons behind things.

#6

Raisin

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Hey maybe this will finally make people realize how stupid the "local/regional talent" idea is and appreciate their team's players regardless of where they're from.

#8

Hater

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This isn't really a good representation of the system though. Local talent at a city level I will admit makes very little sense to be your primary objective, it's like making yourself your own little region with a incredibly low population to pull from when making your team (kind of mini OCE). Though regional talent is actually huge. Paris is a good example of this at an overwatch league level. they built a brand around being the European team and marking there European (and particularly french players). You can also see this in contenders teams like Hurricane who marked there EU players to show bring EU fans to there NA brand with a Korean main team. A hurdle that would be much harder without there regional talent at a contenders level. Looking for local talent is fine if you have a large enough area to pull from like a country or region. But if your limiting yourself to 1 city, thats just stupid.

#14

Frozello

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I think it's pretty neat for Paris going for European way with core being French. Same goes for British Hurricane as Academy it's cool that they wanted at least have a Brit in their team.

I don't know it's pretty hard to compare NA OWL/Contenders teams vs Paris. Of course it would be cool, if NA OWL teams would have a player from their own City, but I don't think that's very likely at the moment, but in 5 years possibly. Like, if New York would have a player born in Los Angeles isn't probably the same marketing wise than French born player in Paris (mostly because we only have 1 team in France).

It will be interesting to see, which OWL team manages to appeal the best for their home crowd for 2020. Personally London doesn't interest me that much (even it was only EU team last year), but then again it's people in London area that should be interest to go and see their home games. I don't think any team wants to have millions of fans in the world, but then not enough people come to see their home games as all the fans are far away from their home city.

#16

Raisin

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If your team exists solely for marketing, that's kind of unfair to the players. The Hurricane players will never move up to Spitfire and Cloud 9 can make other OWL teams pay more in transfer fees than the players might otherwise come with, making it harder for them to get signed into OWL. A Contenders team should be a feeder team to develop prospects that you want to bring up to OWL one day. Similar to how it is with minor league baseball in the US, the organization doesn't care about the success of the whole Contenders team as much as they care about cultivating talent that they can bring up to their OWL team. If you own an OWL team, which would you rather have, a team that wins Contenders in your region but provides no boost to your main team or 2 solid players that you can bring up to the big leagues in case a player on the main team can't keep their spot for whatever reason? If Spitfire continues to drag in top British talent into Hurricane but doesn't give them a chance to make OWL, that hurts the EU scene more than if the Academy team had Koreans.

#19

Raisin

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Mind you, that isn't to say I think teams should go full Korean. The most consistent and meta-proof teams throughout S1 OWL were Valiant and Gladiators after getting Fissure. Mixed teams are the way to go. Limiting your talent pool to a single region, even if that region is Korea, is a mistake, but if you're going to make that mistake, don't keep around players you aren't going to sign just for marketing.

#7

robokun87

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Wants local talent so kicks a Canadian and two Americans and keeps two South Koreans, what in the actual fuck. Surely adding some New Yorkers to the mix of an already NA team would make sense right? honestly the mad obsession everyone in the OWL has with Koreans is shocking.

#20

KuroiRyuu9625

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Can't even argue with you on this one.

#9

murasaki

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everyone is missing the point that this is purely for the benefit of their OWL team. NYXL were never ever going to move any non-koreans up into their main team so what is the point of keeping some probably highly paid American talent when they can just get some more Korean players under the wing of the Contenders team. The "local talent" thing is just a ploy, sure they might sign some NY players but that's only to pad the bench.

#11

Frozello

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That's the main point pretty much. There's no real reason to keep same players in your Contenders team until someone might want to buyout them, if that takes 2+ years.

I absolutely have no idea, if any known player without a team is from NY area. The idea for getting some local area players is good, but makes you wonder though, what if local talent they would find would be Main Tank and/or Off-Tank? I'm thinking this, because obviously Tizi and Woohyal are their current MT and OT.

Local talent might be just a PR move or something, but have to give the credit for that NYXL do have some Koreans who can speak good English (and that is actually shown in their videos much more than London does with full Korean roster) and maybe by Season 3 or 4 there would be a chance mixed team in NYXL

#21

murasaki

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m0xy is from NY

#10

MotherMarion

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Boring PR move, if they cared about having locals in XL2 they would still have Midnight.

#12

wentaway

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Is he from NY area?

#15

MotherMarion

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Yes, according to his twitter info he is from Staten Island, NY.

#23

wentaway

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Then I'd say yes, not such a great move, thanks mate.

#13

wentaway

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Damn duplicate post -.-

#17

Hellafine

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oh that's how you get those stars..

#18

Hellafine

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okay

#22

wentaway

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Dammit you got me! :D

#24

Shun

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They can start their own team called

Xtra Large Leftovers