Call Of Duty League 2022 Major I/Championship Sunday takeaways — It’s been such a long time, but they made it

And just like that, Optic Texas are your Major I champions! It was a long road there, although not for Optic, with plenty of drama along the way. Let’s take a look at all of that in our takeaways down below!

London Royal Ravens vs Optic Texas

• If you forgot somehow, London is a killer Hardpoint team. They looked tremendous on Berlin, not only breaking points like we’re used to, but also out-rotating Optic, which is something they haven’t done as well. If that comes together for them, they’ll be even harder to beat on any Hardpoint, and they’re already scary in that mode.
• The Royal Ravens apparently forgot how to play Call Of Duty after that first map, because it wasn’t even close the rest of the way. They got absolutely wrecked, 6-0ed on Berlin S&D, 3-0ed on Gavutu Control, and beaten 250-178 in a Tuscan Hardpoint that wasn’t even close.
• Poor Gismo went from looking like one of the best players in the game to being bodied. He had a .65 KD and -25 kills. He has to be better if they want a rematch versus Optic.

• Optic followed up their 6-0 of Faze on Tuscan Search and Destroy with a 6-0 on London on Berlin. Dashy was doing it all, holding down every lane and being an immovable object. His 9.00 KD is definitely the reason they were perfect, although Illey’s 1v3 certainly set the tone.
• After that S&D you could see how Optic got in their groove. It seemed like they were literally everywhere, swarming London and overwhelming them. There’s not a team playing better right now than them, and that might spell that ever elusive tournament win.
• Yeah, Dashy is great, but if they want to win their first title in a long time Shotzzy has to keep up this run. Sure, he may not have had the +22 kills Dashy did, but he impacted the map in the way only he can, being annoying and breaking up the best laid plans the other team puts together.

Atlanta Faze vs Toronto Ultra

• Bocage Hardpoint is a map Atlanta feels most comfortable on, and for good reason. It benefits the slaying teams, and as good as Toronto is, Faze is just better. They repeated what the win versus Optic looked like on this one, a bit rough at the start, but then pulling it away as the guns got hot.
• aBeZy wanted to show everyone that donut versus Optic was a fluke. He already had some redemption with an 11/3 stat line in the Game 5 versus the Thieves to send them to the next round, and then followed it up with another 11/3 on Desert Siege. It was an interesting one because we saw him playing a little slower with an Automaton in hand.
• If Faze can use this and the London game to figure out their Control, they’ve at least got a shot at going into the Grand Finals and stealing one versus Optic. They played a great map, especially the offense that looked somewhat over but turned into a win via a smart stack and aBeZy shredding the reinforcements.

• I’m not against Insight sniping at all, but Faze kept him jumpy the whole round. If you’re not hitting with it, it’s probably better to put it away, because Atlanta kept punishing them. A 6-1 loss and 0-2 down could have been mitigated had they made the call to get him in an Automaton.
• Toronto just seemed on the back foot from the get go. They kept it somewhat close in the opening Bocage, but their issues with getting broken on Hardpoint reared their ugly head. How they made it to top 4 losing all of their Hardpoints in this tournament is a testament to how good they can be.
• Not only was every player in the negative on kills with everyone below a .95, Cammy as their top damage player only edged out Atlanta’s worst damage player in Cellium, and then only by 93 damage points. You don’t win getting outslayed like that.

London Royal Ravens vs Atlanta Faze

• Facing a team that could hold on Hardpoint, London looked strangely human in that mode after tearing several teams to shreds. Maybe it was just the steadiness of Faze, but if they can’t do it, nobody can.
• You can say at least one thing about the Ravens, they don’t give up. Down 5-1 they decided they had nothing left to do and flew at Faze, who had no answer to the ferocity. Five rounds later and you almost thought Faze was going to blow another series they had the lead on.
• If you’re the Ravens, you finished top 3, which is miles better than last year. You have some lessons to learn, but there was already plenty of that on display on this tournament, so expect them to be back here again in Major II.

• It was the immovable object versus the unstoppable force. The Faze holds on Hardpoint versus the Ravens breaks. The immovable object pulled this one off with two great maps, on Tuscan and Gavutu. Maybe it wasn’t always perfect, but the especially the repeat hold on the best breaking team in the game on P4 of Gavutu was insane.

• Cellium on Desert Siege is a cheat code. I don’t know what teams are sniping versus them, at least on Desert Siege. He started this one 10-0, and he’s literally shutting down the entire B bomb site. It may not have ended the way they wanted it to (not at all), but that setup is tough to break.
• For Faze, they’ve got to play consistently and not allow breakdowns, especially against an Optic team who seems to be moving past that chapter. The crowd will be against them, and they’ve played a crap ton of COD. They’ll have to be mentally tough to handle everything Optic throws at them, and they really can’t make any mistakes.

Optic Texas vs Atlanta Faze

• Optic hit the ground running this Major and never stopped. You could see it in their faces, their gameplay, their body language. They wanted this win ever so badly in front of their home crowd in their house, and they earned every bit of it.
• Everyone, including myself, thought Shotzzy would have to go nuts in order for Optic to win this thing. Turns out, Scump having a resurgence is what brought it all together. His 1.12 KD was a big part of the victory, but almost every one of his kills impacted the map control and Faze’s rotations or setups. That Scump is in fact the King.
• Dashy may have been the more heralded player going into this, but Illey brought his A game, finishing +17 kills and with a 1.17 KD. He was always making smart plays, and one of the most valuable was watching his break on the Tuscan Hardpoint that put Optic up 3-1, a big win in a swing map for the series.

• For Atlanta this one stings, but you have to shake this off and keep working. They and Optic are the clear leaders in the CDL, no one else approaches them, and as insane as it sounds, Faze has looked uncomfortable in Vanguard so far. If they can start stringing together great performances instead of one star popping off at a time, they’ll win another tournament.
• Case in point, Simp had another tough series. He didn’t have a single map where he went positive, and his -24 kills impacted his team tremendously. He, like Scump or Shotzzy, can dictate a map with his play, and they read him like a book. He’s been arguably the most uncomfortable of all his teammates so far, so hopefully he can get things figured out.
• I don’t think Faze pull off a Finals win anyway, but Arcitys lag on the Gavutu Control really changed the series for them. They could have been up 2-1 in the series, but lost an 18-5 life count round because of it. Sure, they got a replay, but we all know you can’t generally replicate that, especially as good as that kind of round is.

Stay tuned to Gaming Trend for our takeaways as Major II begins, and we’ll do our best to bring you content here and on our YouTube channel! You can follow the league both live and after hours on the official Call Of Duty League YouTube channel right here. If you want to jump into the game, check out CallOfDuty.com, and if you want to know more about it first, check out our review right here.

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