This past week was a weak one for stonk changes. Things have been rather chalk and hopefully the Summer Showdown will shake it up. Bad teams are bad and good teams are good. There were some notable stonk changes this past week, so there will be a stonk report. Welcome to the OWL Stonk Report.
Stonks Up: Philadelphia Fusion
Image Clip Courtesy of the Philadelphia Fusion
The Fusion are the best team that gets no recognition. The Dragons, Charge, Shock and Eternal all get their due respect because they won tournaments this season. The Fusion this season meanwhile are sitting there like a beautiful guy who can not get a prom date. They have the second best record in the league, but are tied for first if you remove tournament wins. They finished second and third in the two tournaments that have happened this season. They have maybe the deepest roster in the league and the MVP front runner in Carpe. Yet they are considered the third best team in NA. After a slightly shaky game last week, the Fusion returned to not drop a single map versus the Valiant and Fuel. A win in the Countdown Cup would rightfully vault the Fusion back into the mainstream conversion for best team in NA.
Stonks Down: Dallas Fuel
Where to begin with this team. They went 0-2 this week and only won a single map. Then at the time of writing this they released their star player, head coach and an assistant coach. While Aero’s departure was inevitable, Decay’s release was surprising at best. This team traded their main tank this past offseason to get one of the most talented DPS players in the league. It is not a great look considering the last time this happened to Dallas, Rascal became one of the biggest pieces of the SF Shock. This team needs a complete overhaul. Ideally, they follow the Florida Mayhem playbook and rebound next year. Will they do that, who knows.
Stonks Up: Atlanta Reign
The Atlanta Reign may have lost Babybay, but they wasted no time bringing new players in to fill out the roster. Saucy, formerly of the now defunct Atlanta Academy, was brought onto the team to replace Babybay. Remember how Kodak became a coach a few weeks ago, well they found someone there too. Lr1s, the former Third Impact flex support, joined this roster as well. The new additions made their debuts this week and did not disappoint. Their 3-1 win over the Dallas Fuel showcased that they are still a team to not take lightly. This roster is better, it is time to see how they perform.
Stonks Down: Boston Uprising
No matter how bad they end up doing, it is hard not to feel pain for these guys. For the second straight tournament, the Uprising ended up bowing out in the play-ins. Myunbong and Punk are players who can be franchise players for this roster if they stay around. It is hard to say if this team is bad because of talent, coaching or a mix of both. This team should be better than the Justice, but they simply can’t seem to find many wins. This roster will need work and they will likely have a new coach, but this team has a decent looking future as of now.
Stonks Up: Vancouver Titans
The Titans are not a bad team and have proven that recently. Their defeat of the Uprising this past week only continued to prove that point. Carcar had his best game in OWL with a performance reminiscent of his days on Fusion University. While they may not do much this year, the Titans’ future is very bright. Dalton, Shockwave, KSAA and Carcar are all great and should definitely be part of this team in the future. Do not fret, they will return more mighty than before.
Stonks Down: Houston Outlaws
There is only one word to describe the Outlaws and that is pain. The Outlaws first game of the weekend was a heartbreaking five map loss to the LA Valiant. They followed that match up with a brutal loss to the SF Shock. While Linkzr is a fun personality and a great widow, this team needs another DPS. Danteh is this team’s best Sombra and Genji by a good amount. Ideally, they pick up either a flex DPS who can play those two heroes at a similar level or a Hitscan player that has a good histcan pool and a nice Sombra. It is not quite the same, but the team should look for a player with similar talent to BQB, Heesu, Soon or Edison. This team could still make some noise in playoffs, but those odds continue to diminish.
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