The mood on the broadcast was tense.
Toronto was coming off a spicy losers bracket run, during which they won three straight after falling to Atlanta, 3-1. Now they had to play them again in the grand finals and there wouldn’t be a second chance this time.
Four Europeans lingered outside their practice facility in Hogtown after their coaches forced them to go take a break. It felt like the room before the boss in The Legend of Zelda, except there were no health items to help Cameron “Cammy” McKilligan and company recover from a long weekend of Call of Duty.
The Ultra weren’t fazed by the task ahead of them; quite the opposite in fact. They were relaxed, as they’d all been in similar situations in their careers before. They didn’t even discuss strategy in order to keep the mojo that helped them get this far intact. Cammy knew just what to say to get the team pumped up.
“Alright guys,” he said while laughing. “Let’s go get 5-0’d.”
Tobias “CleanX” Juul Jønsson, rookie Jamie “Insight” Craven and Ben “Bance” Bance chuckled as they walked back to their computers. They were ready to take on the Atlanta FaZe — the top dogs in the league — in a best-of-nine grand finals of the Stage 2 Major — a format change introduced by league officials last year.
Taking on Atlanta in a best-of-nine grand finals
“I’m a bit of mixed opinions about it,” CleanX told me. “It depends on what team you are on. If you’re coming from losers you have the upper hand. You just played two games that day while the other team is coming in cold.”
The Ultra had just finished a wild losers bracket run, complete with a double bomb reversal against OpTic Chicago and clean wins over Los Angeles, Minnesota and Dallas. They were coming into the match against FaZe steamier than a Krig 6 unloading across Raid.
The Ultra had some jitters in the opening round of Hardpoint, but they got their groove back with Search and Destroy on Miami. The match went back and forth until Round 6 when Toronto took control of the series.
“Toronto having such momentum coming off such a losers bracket, it helped them going into the grand finals,” Tyler “aBeZy” Pharris, FaZe SMG star, said. “I’m not going to downplay that, though. They played better Call of Duty that day.”
ABeZy knew that they had lost once they entered Round 8, Hardpoint on Checkmate. He thought that Toronto’s teamwork was too much to overcome.
Losers bracket winner has an advantage
The Ultra are the only team to have beaten the FaZe in a grand final this season. That’s an impressive feat, but it’s nothing compared to the fact that Atlanta has played in every single grand final in 2021. They are the final boss of the Call of Duty League. Anyone who has wanted a shot at a trophy needed to go through them during a best-of-nine series.
“Honestly it’s not as draining now that I’ve got used to it,” aBeZy said. The majority of players in the league agree that the format is flawed as it stands now. There is no advantage — and possibly a disadvantage — for plowing through all games in the winners bracket.
“Personally I think the one game advantage would be fine, even a bracket reset would work,” aBeZy said. “A one up advantage would be great.”
He said that even adding one more game to the Sunday lineup would be a reasonable solution, giving both teams headed to the grand finals a chance to warm up. The best-of-nine is a beast of it’s own. It can be exhausting, even with the five-minute breaks in between every two rounds.
“The best-of-nine was different,” Obaid “Asim” Asim, New York Subliners’ SMG, said after losing to Atlanta in the grand finals of the Stage 3 Major. “It took us off guard, but we definitely think we can hang with [Atlanta].”
