May Melee is over and the Shanghai Dragons and SF Shock on winning their respective regions. Now with a large break, this will be the last stonk report for a while, but that doesn’t mean there is not much to talk about. The May Melee created some interesting stories to look at. Welcome to the OWL Stonk Market.
Stonks Up: Flordia Mayhem
In the most unexpected run of the weekend, the Florida Mayhem blew threw the Atlanta Reign and Philadelphia Fusion on the way to the Finals. In a 2019 Stage 3 Shanghai Dragons like run they dominated competition. The only thing they did not do like the Dragons was beat the Shock. Yaki is one of the biggest rising stars in the league and one of the top three rookie of the year candidates right now. Fate is the comeback story of the year with his return to season one form. Additionally, Gargoyle is becoming one of the most underrated players in OWL. He can play every off-tank to a very good level. Florida for now can be called a top five team and can move up even more after matches return.
Stonks (Slightly) Down: Philadelphia Fusion
The Fusion were looking like potentially the best team in OWL it until the May Melee, but then some old habits reared their heads. The questionable decision making returned versus the Mayhem especially on Watchpoint: Gibraltar. The Fusion opted onto a Tracer/Soldier: 76 composition which before this match resulted in their only loss. Additionally, they seemed to take the term “winnable” too literally. A perfect example of that was the fight in point a defenders spawn after capping point a. They took an unnecessary fight chasing people off respawn, used ultimates and ended up coming out on the worse end despite having the advantage. The Fusion will need to clean their act up and potentially work on new team compositions, they’ll need it.
Stonks Up: Vancouver Titans
Who knew one signing could make such a difference. Leading up to their play in match, the Titans signed former Montreal Rebellion DPS Shockwave. While it was a very quiet move, it had a massive effect. He put on an Echo master class and nearly carried the Vancouver Titans to a match win. The team looked so much better with him now in the mix and they will only get better. While they won’t be great, they will get better.
Stonks Down: Atlanta Reign
Who remembers when the Reign were ranked as the second best team in the league? They definitely aren’t anymore. The Reign had a disappointing finish to their May Melee, losing 3-1 to the Florida Mayhem. The whole match they looked overmatched and scattered. This past month has only raised more questions than answers for the Reign. Namely, where the heck is Erster? One of the best players throughout OWL last season has not even smelled the server. Edison has seemingly taken over all of his former DPS duties. Meanwhile, Babybay is still starting. Don’t take this the wrong way, Babybay is one of the best stories of this seasons. Is Babybay better than Sharp, who is seeing almost no play time? It may be worth trying that for an extended period of time soon because the Atlanta Reign look like a Phoenix that won’t get reborn.
Stonks Down: NYXL
What are they doing? Once again the NYXL even with all their talent pull some questionable stuff. They decided to run Doomfist a lot despite it being a bad meta for him.They played a massive amount of Reinhardt/Zarya, a tank line that was not prevalent this weekend. Every match the NYXL play the create more questions about their coaching staff and players. Whoru looks like a shell of his former self, albeit Genji is unplayable. SBB is playing fine but Nene would be preferred if he could get healthy. This team is a top ten team, but not top five.
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Featured image courtesy of Overwatch League.
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