OpTic Chicago will always be among the top teams in the Call of Duty League, but in order to be the best of the best, there are some improvements they need to make in key areas of their game.
It seems like no matter what, OpTic will always carry the biggest name and the most clout when it comes to Call of Duty teams and franchises. That said, while historically they’ve been among the most successful teams in CoD esports history, that’s not been the case since the scene turned to franchising and the CDL.
That’s held true especially this season; while teams like Atlanta FaZe have remained consistently at the top, other sides like Toronto Ultra and New York Subliners have seemingly leapfrogged the Green Wall in terms of in-game superiority.
After a difficult Stage 3 group play, Scump and co. did rediscover some of their groove when they went on that big Losers Bracket run at the Major, but for them to break into that highest tier again, they do need to make important adjustments.
Expanding their map-set
Since Stage 2, the only Hardpoint maps that OpTic have a positive record on against the top half of the league are Checkmate (3-1) and Garrison (2-0). They are a combined 0-6 in Apocalypse, Moscow, and Raid when playing those maps against the league’s best sides.
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Things look even direr in Control – they’re 1-1 on Checkmate while a very poor 1-4 on Raid, which totals to a 2-5 record against top teams in that mode.
Needless to say, if the Green Wall is to emerge again as one of the CDL’s top-two teams, they’ll definitely have to expand the list of maps that they’re comfortable playing and can succeed on, or else they’ll constantly find themselves facing the likes of FaZe, NYSL, and Ultra on maps that they’re currently poor at.
Rediscover their respawn form
For most of the 2020 season and 2021 Stage 1, the identity that many fans associated with OpTic was that they were a dominant respawn team that had their shortcomings in S&D. Well, for pretty much all of Stages 2 and 3, there have been some major cracks in their respawn game as well, which has obviously played a big role in their struggles.
For the boys in green to truly be great again, they’ll need to find that form and become the ‘free-flowing’ respawn team that they’ve historically been, so that whenever they are struggling in S&D, they can still rely on their ruthless, punishing dominance in HP & Control to carry them through matches.
The good news is that LAN is returning for the Stage 4 Major, the first offline event in nearly a year and a half. Historically, OG has been superb on LAN, so the team and their fans will have high hopes as long as the adjustments discussed above are made.
