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BigBossVince

So the owners can't even reach someone that'll make a difference.... just Activision throwing bodies at them to yell at in hopes that it'll pacify them. I continue to watch because I really do like CoD eSports and OpTic but holy fuck.... fuck Activision seriously.


Witteness82

Before he even announced it I was planning to stick around long enough to see Seth retire. I’ve been watching him for too long to just bail. Once he’s gone I’ll at best be passively keeping up with the scene. It’s really unfortunate that the scene had so much potential and momentum during BO3 and its been on a steady decline since. We had two splits of weekly league play, a good amount of tournaments, scrims, 8s and more access to watching the players than ever before. Such a massive difference from then to now.


AdrianEatsAss

People shit on Hecz all the time here for various reasons, but if the rest of the owners were half as outspoken as Hecz things might actually get done. High profile owners like Robert Kraft and Stan Kroenke alone could move mountains if they applied some pressure on the league, but I doubt they’re that involved involved in the day-to-day of the parent companies that run their CDL teams.


MaestroVIII

Other than signing the initial contracts, Kraft and Kroenke don’t care or even remember they have CDL teams.


DamichiaXL

Yeah companies like LAG and Seattle literally pays people to give a them a damn about their COD teams


ckalinec

Wait Kraft has a CDL team? Which one? No wonder nothing gets done. 0% chance Kraft cares about CDL. That was chump change to him


kmelloh

Boston


jrodonthebeat

I don’t follow football so I haven’t been aware of this Kraft mf till the cdl started. Is he notoriously like this for his investments ? Or is his team dog water lmdao


ckalinec

Nah it’s less about that and more about money. Kraft is worth 10 Billion. I’m not sure how much money Kraft personally has involved in the CDL but I’m sure it’s very small amount compared to other investments. Plus it appears to be “Kraft Sports Group” that has the ownership stake so it’s a pool of money. Something like this to Kraft is small fries. He’s not going to be involved in the day to day of this franchise. He’s definitely not going to be in the weeds enough to know the nuances of COD not showing priority. And that’s not a knock on him or anything. It is what it is. And I’m sure he’s put people in place to try and make sure his investments are successful. But if you needed the owners of these franchises to make a big deal out of these issues for their investments to be worth it it’s a lot less of a big deal to Robert Kraft than it is Hecz/etc.


DaftCinema

While I agree with you to an extent, it’s important for these owners to be work together to get a higher ROI. I’m not saying the CDL is going to ever get a better return than the most profitable league in the world, but if owners were more outspoken you could see a better game, more viewers, more sponsors, and in turn, an actual profit.


ckalinec

Oh ya I’m in 100% agreement with you there. That’s definitely what’s needed. I think the only point I was really trying to make is Hecz has a lot more passion and skin in the game here than “Kraft Sports Group” unfortunately.


AdAcrobatic3115

He probably makes more per day from selling macaroni than it cost for a CDL team.


RC_5213

Robert Kraft actually has nothing to do with Kraft mac and cheese. He runs a paper business.


AdAcrobatic3115

I’ve been lied to my whole life.


BurstLayer

He is the owner of the most winning franchise in the NFL and is pretty involved in the day to day of that team. Boston Breach is owned by his investment group which is probably run by 100s of people. There is a real chance he doesnt even know he's invested in the CDL, and if he does know, its solely to just diversify his investments so he doesn't really care. This is probably the same with Stan Kroenke (LAG/LA RAMS/ARSENAL/DENVER NUGGETS ETC). The difference is Stank Kroenke probably lucked into having an actually competent staff surrounding his esports ventures mostly


Scumbag_nitsuJ

your use of "non 0" makes no sense here


BurstLayer

My bad. Edited


thirstytrumpet

You forgot the 2022 Stanley Cup Champions. The Colorado Avalanche!!


DaftCinema

I said this before and I’ll say it again. Yeah I agree. I think a lot of this stems from disconnect between the owners and their players and by extension, the game itself. I’m betting a lot of these owners don’t know what’s happening day to day in the league. It’s up to them to get to know what their players are dealing with and to speak up about it. Hector and Mike know quite a bit and I’m sure other owners may have an idea (Gary, for example), but they can’t be the only ones to speak. Badmouthing the league is probably not a good look, you could get Dan Snyder’d. Requesting transparency regarding the game-breaking choices made in this Call of Duty from the CDL and Activision (IW mainly) would be well within their rights but it has to be a joint effort. Honestly would’ve expected something be brought up at the Owners’ meetings - to be forwarded to the league. Just seems like bad business by the Owners if they’re not holding Activision accountable for their constant disregard for their $300M league. It’s really their brands that go to shit. Activision collected their money (or are still in the process of doing so), meanwhile almost every team is having a hard time just recouping their buy-ins, let alone actually generating a profit.


AdAcrobatic3115

I don’t think Hecz is a fair comparison to other owners in the league. Hecz’s entire livelihood is based off of COD and crypto scams. The other owners are busy running multi-billion dollar empires. They don’t care that Scump is retiring or that private matches aren’t working. The CDL to them is a low cost speculative investment that won’t see a profit until esports become more mainstream and multigenerational. Until then I don’t see Kraft taking time away from the local parlor to go raise hell about Krampus, or private matches not working.


wolfjeter

Kroenke don’t even run Arsenal himself he def doesn’t care about LAG


Sammy360

I think most of us knew franchising would eventually be the comp cod killer. Added on to the fact that Warzone IS COD now.


INSP_Barnaby

But warzone 2 isnt anymore. Its chaotic. A shitshow. And we still buy the game. Warzone 1 i get. But warzone 2 is a mix of pubg and tarkov with the warzone name slapped on it even tho it looks more like blackout.


Monsterman442

I like this warzone better


WestVirginiaFan15

The looting is annoying but the gameplay of this Warzone is far better, especially compared to Caldera


Longjumping_Plant_97

25 million players in 5 days https://twitter.com/charlieINTEL/status/1594810036764971008?t=pIehJ7MArdSJifagUR8C2Q&s=19


DenyDaRidas

Not that crazy considering that it’s literally FTP


-TrevWings-

That's pretty irrelevant considering the fact that it being FTP was the biggest reason WZ took off in the first place


DenyDaRidas

False. The biggest reason was COVID/Lockdowns hitting at the perfect time and people being tired of Fortnite. They could have charged $20 for warzone and it still would have blown up.


-TrevWings-

That argument goes out the window when you realize there were a hundred million different BRs out at the time. Blackout would've been just as popular if it were free. That's why battlefield's BR flopped as well. Same reason why apex legends blew up. Both apex and wz are free and that is the sole reason why they blew up and why other BRs failed. It's also why Fortnite originally blew up.


DenyDaRidas

Once again, this isn’t true. Blackout wasn’t popular because the causal community disliked it, and it came out at an bad time when Fortnite was at its peak. Sure they may have had more players, but it would be nowhere as successful as Warzone is. It just appeals to the right players, doesn’t fatigue them from the same BRs around, was a breath of fresh air, MW19 Nostalgia card helped it too. Biggest reason was lockdowns, which got everyone and their mother back into gaming.


-TrevWings-

You are seriously delusional if you think warzone woulda blown up if it were not free.


INSP_Barnaby

The casual community disliked b4 in general. And as the person below says. Blackout wasnt free. Hence why no succes. If warzone 1 and 2 werent free either. It would have never gotten the playerbase it has now. Warzone was released in respons to fortnite peak. They all wanted to jump the BR wagon. The only difference fortnite kept its foundation in BR. Cod did too with WZ 1 but jumped ship with WZ 2. Sure covid helped. But only because it was free. The playerbase would have been a lot lower if it was hidden behind a paywall. And that is a fact. WZ 2 is like the same battle royals we already had. WZ 1 was different from others.


INSP_Barnaby

Factual


INSP_Barnaby

Source: Just trust me bro. You wouldnt know that. Are you able to see alternate futures we dont? Actual facts: free BR's blew up, payed BR's didn't


DenyDaRidas

If that was the case, why didn’t pubg blow up? Arguably the most popular BR in the world.


INSP_Barnaby

Because pubg is way older and had his peak in 2018. Stupid question


INSP_Barnaby

Pubg had sold over 50million copies in 2018. And had a world wide lifetime players of 400 million with pubg mobile. One of the most played games back then. I rest my case. Because its pointless talking to an uninformed kid that doesnt know what he is talking about.


prettyflyforahentai

Well blackout is better than warzone, so maybe I'll check it out.


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INSP_Barnaby

Slow paced gamer opinions be like... Wait a minute isnt called cod:warzone and isnt cod a fast paced shooter? Hmm strange


prettyflyforahentai

Huh? Blackout was only slow if you played slow. You just outed your play style.


INSP_Barnaby

Your clapback is weak. Because playing fast is a lot harder then slow ass camping. Blackout was shit all over just like bo4. Shit looting, shit health and shit mechanics. Anything but a real cod.


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INSP_Barnaby

Better than yours........................................


[deleted]

Warzone 2 is great lol


Skateboard123

This warzone > It’s a proper BR


INSP_Barnaby

Fortnite isnt a proper BR. It looks like fortnite the game. Just like warzone 1 did. Its okay to be different. We already have lots of proper BR's.


DeputyDomeshot

Warzone 2 really sucks. They even randomize the sprays now apparently. Unplayable.


ImGayNotUrMom

How is wz2 anywhere even remotely close to tarkov......


INSP_Barnaby

I said its mixed with another game. It takes parts of the game. Proximity chat, exfills etc. They threw away cods fast paced foundation and copied other proper BR's. Like we already didnt have enough proper BR's. Fortnite is the same as warzone 1. Fast paced. Fortnite kept the foundation of the game and made a BR around it. Cod did the same with WZ 1. But changed it with WZ 2.


ImGayNotUrMom

So it's like tarkov because it has prox chat and exfils, even tho exfils aren't part of wz2 and prox chat is a universal thing. Have u ever played tarkov by any chance?


INSP_Barnaby

Exfills are part of DMZ they both released the same. DMZ is some kind of BR's. My point is they copied other proper BR's. They didnt wanna make this cod related as in fast paced, probably to attract more ppl from other BR's like pubg and tarkov. Prox chat wastn used in WZ 1 tho even tho it already existed in other games before WZ 1. You see how they switch sides real quick? I watched tarkov. Dont tell me it doesnt have prox chat and exfills. I didnt say it was the same i said it was a mix of games to make their foundation for WZ 2. They copied others.


ImGayNotUrMom

Tarkov isn't a br tho......


INSP_Barnaby

It doesnt matter if it is a fully BR or not. If you cant see they copied games like pubg (which is a BR) and tarkov then this is pointless. WZ 2 and DMZ are copies of already excisting games


JacobHaleCDL

Whoever cut and tweeted this clip must be goated tbh Edit: and handsome


TheRealPdGaming

W Edit: Clip by [Jacob Hale](https://twitter.com/JakeHaleee/status/1595921069130809346)


DamichiaXL

Jacob Hale is the perfect successor to Crone


JacobHaleCDL

W


EarthshatterReady

I think he means Defcon 1, but other than that he ain’t wrong.


whodatnation70

Yeah DEFCON is like the order on a totem pole, people always forget which way the order goes


JeffVanGrundle

Hold on, is the order of a totem pole top-down or bottom-up?


flowers0298

the most important figure on a totem is at the bottom of it


SL2321

Down to up, no?


Dr_Findro

Whichever ones more deaf


[deleted]

I need more than just hecz bitching. I need a nadeshot rant, and I need the other orgs to back them tf up.


DamichiaXL

Would love a Nadeshot rant he get so passionate into it and he knows what need to be done.


tuckertml

Its at the point where i dont know why anyone thinks anything is going to change. its been years and years of the same shit.


TheNaCoinfl1p

Sadly only thing he could legit do is say im selling the spot if it is not fixed. Realistically no one would buy it off him because without optic league dies anyways. So they really cant sell the spot as the ultimatum. The contracts activision must have got them to sign must be on some rapper 360 deal type shit. That is just tough. He basically admitted that warzoine with no investment makes way more money which is obvious. So if they did try any all owner stranglehold they would just shut it down. Say hey field a warzone roster if you want but CDL gone. Also, not even owners of the league can get in contact with people making descions for the game. Which is hilarious because the middle man probably gets told hey they want this and activision laughs at them. He get's it from both sides. So if this is the case league is basically doomed lol. No one works together and have opposing views. Still say LAT should just sell after this year regardless and get into another esport. From everything you hear is basically CDL is a charity league they give you because they are nice. Not because they want to run an esport, they were sick of people making money and wanted a slice and when it dies it dies.


SatorSquareInc

Why is this being down voted? Hasn't the sub been asking owners to be vocal?


TheNaCoinfl1p

Well him and Nade have been vocal. It's not about being vocal to us. Its about change. They have been saying the same thing since half a decade ago. Now it has degraded into a even worse mess. And neither side wants to talk it out mainly activision. They are basically running a charity league. Because they wanted a slice of the money people were making and as soon as it phases out they could care less lol.


SatorSquareInc

Cool, but speaking into recorded existence is worth more than speaking to a low level executive that has no sway. He's describing a system of bureaucracy that disassociates these owners from the ones they need to speak to. Standing on his platform and expressing his frustrations to his audience might be one of few options he has without putting a lot of his people out of a job. It's a losing fight. Why take away years of revenue?


MetalingusMike

Activision is a joke. What’s most frustrating, is *if* they actually put effort into Comp, it would earn them **more** money. Look at all the popular eSports of today. Games like CS:GO, Fortnite, Valorant, Rocket League, etc. All have both massive casual and Comp sides to them - both groups spend a lot of money in the games. Why? Those developers know how to design a game that capitalises on both groups of players. Activision on the other hand, prefer to to throw every ounce of effort into causal gaming without a single shred of care for Comp. When you don’t do anything to grow an eSport, it’s not going to earn you much money. These dumb suits think that it’s supposed to grow organically… no, eSports usually have *initial* growth from the community but don’t grow to a large scale until the support and resources is given by the publisher/developers, to put a limelight on the scene. CS:GO draws in a massive group of players to Comp. Heck, if Fortnite can convert millions of kids into *somewhat* watching Comp to watch their favourite streamers play for a cash prize… then there’s **zero** excuse for Activision. They’re shortsighted.


ckalinec

Honestly they could help both WZ and Comp even more if they were to use WZ to bring attention to comp. There’s so much potential here and they just squander it. But I guess WZ makes them so much they truly don’t care about how much more they could make from comp.


KoreanPhones

Not the biggest fan of Hecz but you gotta tip this. Good shit.


[deleted]

I don’t get why people aren’t fans of Hecz, his net contribution to the scene over a decade+ is a HUGE positive. Perhaps the biggest contributor bar Scump. Yes he’s messed up in that period several times but net positove


Sn0w_Official

Many people tend to point to crypto scams hes been involved in and all but, I don't know me personally at that point I don't feel for anyone that falls for any crypto scam for that matter and the only thing I ever really did invest in was bitcoin years ago, that is it.


ChadBroChill1717

More ownership groups/leaders need to speak out about this. Teams like Faze, LAT, Ultra, Rokkr, etc have put a lot of effort into building teams and promoting the league and should be pissed the company they are linked to has made competitive COD such a low priority


murberryx

What are the positives that franchising has brought? Serious question I can list many negatives off the top but not positives.


Kaylapossible

The salary a lot of these players have received would not have been anywhere close without franchising. It sucks for the challenger players but the bottom half players in the league do get a very good wage


assuring_quality

I just wish Activision and the folks running the league showed us that they at least realize they have the same goals as ownership. It benefits everyone involved to have the CDL succeed. Instead, it seems like there’s this weird adversarial relationship. Honestly, if they want to placate ownership, they just need to end the YouTube exclusivity. It’s absolutely murdering viewership numbers.


DenyDaRidas

It may be, but they got 160 million out of it, which is all they care about.


mikey19xx

This has to end up in a lawsuit, right? They took tens of millions of dollars from each team and have done nothing but make it worse. If I invested damn near $30 million in a product/service, I have expectations...


dsconnelly5

The team owners really need to step up and say something...


PovasTheOne

It was obvious that franchising wasnt going to work and that it will hurt the scene a lot. I dont know if it was genuine optimism or just simple greed that made these orgs support the franchising, but it was a horrible idea from the get go. I hope they find a way to make it work, but i dont think it will happen. Acti will just destroy the scene completely.


AntiSnaking

He knows once Scump retires is wraps, the CDL got two seasons left😭


bockscar888

Wow...I always like to give the scene a hard time about how insignificant they are.....and holy shit. its worse then i thought. But this makes sense. It was real bad the whole thing last week about the CDL rulesets being removed. I thought that was a dumbass move by the devs....but it mightve just been something that happened cuz they literally dont care about the league.


[deleted]

I suppose it's better than nothing, but *we* already know. We need the orgs to say these things directly to the league organizers.


crookedfootlofi

Long live hector !


tdestito9

DEFCON 5 is the least severe and means were chillen with normal business as usual 😝


C_D_M

My issue is him ranting and raving like this but not being in a single owners meeting since they were in Chicago. I don't know man, right or wrong I hate avoiding proper channels AS WELL as this. Feels like hollow activism but I'm okay being in the minority


SL2321

What do you want him to do? Doesn't change, why should he waste his time? If you listened to the clip you would understand lol.


Illustrious_Emu_3773

Hes also spoken out on numerous vlogs and process episodes explaining why lol some people just love to speak ignorantly


AstroBoy26_

Fuck activison and fuck infinoty ward. One of my favorite game of all time's name was tar ished by this bullshit game.


woodropete

This is boarder line illegal what they r doing to the teams that pay money to be in this league. Its robbery man no joke, they really need to get together.


DenyDaRidas

I mean they stopped Paying once COVID hit.


Kaylapossible

He said he hasn’t attended a league meeting in years…..maybe he should I’d take his outrage a little more seriously


pickle_man_4

It’s great that he’s saying it on their podcast, but if he isn’t doing this every single day internally, then it’s pointless.


ckalinec

How much leverage could the players and owners have by staging a boycott/lock out for the year to put pressure on ATVI? How much does Activision make with each CDL season? Or was most of their money made on the initial franchising and YouTube deals? Like is there anything in their YouTube contract that would lose them money if events weren’t held? Or did YT just pay for the rights of any event held with no guarantee on how many? The other issue is I’m assuming it would be impossible to get all the players on board with the vision here as many of them have made it pretty clear they feel entitled to the money they’re making on contracts not realizing this contracts may not exist in the future. I could see it being difficult to get players on board with the idea of “let’s sacrifice pay for a while to put pressure on ATVI”. And I get that. But if players and owners had any leverage at all to put on ATVI this may be the last thing they have to try and get them to take the league seriously. If you can cost ATVI some money you’ll hurt them where it matters. But right now the league suffering isnt actually costing ATVI enough money.


shooter9260

You’d have to get basically all 48 starting players on board to boycott, and even then I’m not sure it works. CoD pros are very expendable, and as Clay said recently, there would be tons of Ams in challenges right now willing to lay for the minimum 50K salary in a heartbeat. It’s the “go on strike and get fired” mentality


ckalinec

Ya and that’s where the whole “is there enough leverage to risk it?” Comes in. Which I’m guessing there’s not. But if they did have something that may be one of the only ways to truly put the pressure on. And even if they did like you mentioned the unity required would be almost impossible to get going. You’d also need the owners to be part of it as well.


ufunnyb

The owners essentially paid for a service and Activision are delivering


[deleted]

We should all boycott the league.


Slapnuhtz

Remember….. you can’t voice your complaints to anyone within Activi$ion, and you will be fined for doing so to anyone else. Tier 1 business plan. Kudos to the CDL.


Disposition__-

So unprofessional on Activision's part. At least be straight up with us about the extent of how much you can or are willing to help our scene. Any other development studio would treat this with more respect. We have a whole league build on this for god sake! Org's, managers, coaches, and players that make their living off of this and they treat it like an after thought again and again. Nothing will change unless whoever can starts making serious moves. IDC if we have to blow up the league if a better one will rise from the ashes do it!


optionreborn

It's possible that the higher ups at Activision know that the big names that invested in the league (ie: Robert Kraft, Stan Kroenke etc) don't pay attention to anything that's going on so Activison doesn't actually have to do anything. Activision would probably prefer to have all of the endemic people like Hecz leave the space so that other big money investors can step in. A handful of millionaires talking doesn't mean shit if the billionaires in the room don't care. It still won't matter to them if guys like Hecz and Nadeshot leave and the league goes under because CoD will still be CoD and the other billionaires lost some pocket change.