TL;DW - Four Faces Of Highs And Lows In The Overwatch League

The second week of the Overwatch League was filled with memorable upsets and even more upset predictions, also only resulting in clean sweeps in three of the nine matches. Another twist was the introduction of Push week, making the new game mode the match decider twice. Not every player appears smitten with the new mode, coming to the conclusion that it can feel very "snowbally" and too much space to cover. Others enjoyed it greatly, though didn’t think alternating the rule set each week was a good approach.

Winners and losers in equal shares sat down with us for post-match interviews shortly after the games concluded. Among them was new recruit of the Paris Eternal Cameron "wub" Johnson who stepped into a controversial situation, replacing Nikolai "Naga" Dereli after just two officials. We also talked to Florida Mayhem tank rookie extraordinaire Jeong-wan "SOMEONE" Ham, who was understandably down after their narrow loss against the Outlaws. Jamie "Backbone" O'Neill and Han-been "Hanbin" Choi showed up with bright smiles after their victories against opponents they weren’t necessarily expected to beat at this stage of the season.

Because we know that committing to an hour of interviews at a time can be hard to fit in, we summarised the most important talking points for you in our Too long; didn’t watch series!

Backbone After London Spitfire Vs Boston Uprising

• Being together makes it a lot easier to improve 

"We just like playing Rein. It's that simple" 

• They had to figure out where to play Reinhardt after the Shock match 
• The Spitfire think predicting what Marvel is playing is the hardest 
• London did well in scrims in the week prior to their matches
• They heard of more teams playing Tracer hence why they saw an opportunity to play Shax 
• They tried a map with Poko on Doom in scrims, and they didn't play around it well 

Hadi : "Nice carry Backbone"
Backbone: "Nice, carry from you, what do you mean?!" 

• Hadi is having a lot of fun with new Reinhardt
• Backbone thinks that the beta is a lot more enjoyable than the alpha but not having ranked and the beta going down soon is a problem 
• He likes playing push while he gets the impression that other players don’t like it much
• Backbone says ATL blacklisted them from scrims three weeks ago

wub After Paris Eternal Vs Toronto Defiant

• wub had mixed emotions finally playing in OWL bat also starting with a rough match
• wub thinks the team lacked confidence but found it on map 2 briefly which made it much closer than on the other maps
• He feels he could've played better and helped the team win
• wub has been scrimming with the team for only a week (we found out after the interview that it was only five days) 
• wub thinks Genji is "alright" in the current meta, but he thinks Tracer is just a better Genji
• The reason why Genji was played more is that SP9RK1E enjoys Genji more and Dallas, therefore, made it meta by playing well with it 
• wub thinks Winston, Soldier, Tracer, Ana, and Lucio is likely the best comp in the current meta 
• wub feels Winston has become the best tank with little to no downsides and teams who don't play him probably just lack a good Winston player 

• wub doesn't like Push and the maps feel too large for 5v5. He prefers control as a decider, but he also likes Overwatch 1 more in general. It also feels very "snowbally" 
• wub didn't have access to the alpha, and he is very behind on his game knowledge. Even mechanics are off because of changes like movement speed of DPS and tracking them, therefore, feels different
• He decided to come back to Overwatch because he still felt he could make it to Overwatch League which has been his goal first goal. Now he wants to become known as a star player and be recognised as the # 1 Genji
• wub thinks he played very well in the 2020 trials but less so in 2021 
• He is confident he could cover hitscan heroes with a bit of time to figure them out
• wub realises the upcoming matches against the Outlaws, Fuel, and Justice will be a tough stretch for the team which is why they will require some time to bounce back but will blossom late into the season

Hanbin After Dallas Fuel Vs Los Angeles Gladiators

• Harbin was angry about how the match started out and used that emotion to play better 
• He says they heard APAC teams play a lot of Zarya, so they wanted to try
• Hanbin felt confident in his clutch on Eichenwalde B attack as he knew the opponent didn't have ultimates

• They tried sparkle on Doomfist but because their tank players are also good at it, they think they didn't need SP9RK1E to role switch
• Harbin thinks it's a huge advantage to have two top tank players because he doesn't have to practice heroes like Winston or Reinhardt and instead focus on his picks 
• Hanbin thinks the Houston crowd gave the Outlaws the momentum to play with confidence which made the difference
• Dallas wants to avoid missing their own homestand at the kickoff Clash at all cost

Someone After Florida Mayhem Vs Houston Outlaws

• They practised very hard for the match against the Outlaws and were confident after reviewing Houston's VOD
• Because their Zarya comp on Push has a range disadvantage, they had to pick their fight locations very carefully which is why they had to give up objective time despite winning more fights
• Someone thinks the Mayhem are an explosive team that can match the best in team fights but need to work on their execution mistakes. Despite losing both Push maps against Houston, it's not something he is concerned about going into the future 

• Someone thinks Doomfist is an easy hero to counter, but they just executed badly 
• Someone feels the biggest difference-maker for tank players is the amount of knowledge they have and get to apply 
• Roadhog is not a great pick usually but because of map architecture on Gibraltar A, it's okay there 
• Someone doesn’t play for individual titles like Rookie of the year. He’d be humbled, but he wants team trophies first and foremost 
• Someone has studied both Kellan and Mag, but he thinks direct player comparisons are not how one should think about Overwatch. One should look more at the whole team and how they play together