As we head into the third tournament of the 2020 Call of Duty League season, there have been numerous roster moves and substitutions taking place among the eight teams attending the event at the Shrine Expo Center in Los Angeles.
With that in mind, we take a look at five important talking points before competition gets underway on Saturday, March 7th.
1) A new-look LA Guerrillas
If rumours are to be believed, the Guerrillas has undergone significant change ahead of its home event. 2014 and 2018 world champion Patrick "Aches" Price, Renato "Saints" Forza and Andres "Lacefield" Lacefield have reportedly been benched in favour of Rasim "Blazt" Ogresevic and two new recruits in the form of Kris "Spart" Cervantez and Reece "Vivid" Drost.
Both Vivid and Spart have had impressive showings in Call of Duty Challengers events, with the latter recently taking victory at the CDC Atlanta Open under the Atlanta FaZe Academy banner.
Currently lying in eight place in the league table, this drastic change to the team looks to be an attempt at a big move towards the top of a very busy mid-table. It will certainly be interesting to see how the Guerrillas perform against OpTic Gaming Los Angeles in its opening game of the tournament.
2) Zer0 out, Happy in
It's not just Seattle and the Guerrillas that underwent change ahead of the LA home series. Trei "Zer0" Morris appears to have been benched from the New York Subliners, with Nick "Happy" Suda taking his place on the starting roster.
This is an interesting move considering that New York did show improvements back in London when the team last competed. As one of the wave of breakout players that exploded onto the scene in 2015, we haven't seen a lot of Happy since but he has competed in several amateur tournaments, with victories to his name.
Either this is a very smart move from the Subliners or it's going to be a realisation that perhaps change may not have been the right answer.
3) Seattle Surge back in action
For the first time since Ian "Enable" Wyatt was demoted to the bench in favour of substitute Casey "Pandur" Romano, the Seattle Surge is back in action in Los Angeles.
The LA event will see Pandur making his debut for the Surge. After seemingly positive improvements in online practice, this change could well be the catalyst for a resurgence for a Seattle team that should not be near the bottom of the table.
It's going to be very interesting to see if the addition of Pandur will be the ingredient that Seattle has been missing throughout the start of the season.
4) How good are the Florida Mutineers?
Hot off the back of a second-place finish from Atlanta, the Florida Mutineers is one of the in-form teams heading into the LA Home Series. After beating Chicago Huntsmen on the way to the finals in Atlanta, the Mutineers appear to be on the rise as one of the teams looking to break away from the tight mid-table battle.
Colt "Havok" McLendon and Cesar "Skyz" Bueno both excelled in their respective roles. If they can both maintain the high levels of performance from Atlanta, then could Florida shock Atlanta in their rematch of the LA
5) Can Atlanta go back-to-back?
After defending its home town with a relatively easy victory against Florida in the finals, Atlanta FaZe are widely considered to be the very best team in the league after Chicago were defeated by the Mutineers in the semi-finals. The FaZe appear to have a perfect balance within the team, with every single player knowing exactly what is needed at any given time in order to secure the victory.
There were some signs that Atlanta could be beaten after some shaky moments against the London Royal Ravens back in Atlanta, but other than that, it is going to be extremely difficult for any of the other seven teams to overcome Atlanta this weekend.
There is a very real chance that Atlanta will be the first team in Call of Duty League history, to win back-to-back events unless an
The third event of the CDL is done and dusted! Find out what happened at the event in this article.
