LA Thieves bench Cuyler “Huke” Garland for Thomas “TJHaLy” Haly, before Stage 4 of the Call of Duty League.
Huke joined the LA Thieves after being benched from Dallas Empire’s main roster, despite seeing positive results on the team. Dallas Empire then moved up Tyler “FeLo” Johnson, who had already been removed from the roster after Dallas failed to win a map at the Stage 3 Major. The Modern Warfare champions then picked up Reece “Vivid” Drost while Huke stayed on LA Thieves’ main roster.
The Thieves finished 5th-6th at the Stage 3 Major after losing in the first round of Winners to the Florida Mutineers. They were then eliminated from the tournament by the Toronto Ultra, who were coming off an undefeated run during the Stage 3 groups. After lackluster results with Huke on the roster, LA Thieves have opted to move him to the bench. TJHaly will take his place back on the original roster that had success throughout Stage 3.
LA Thieves’ head coach Jordan “JKap” Kaplan took to Twitter to explain the confusion around the sudden roster swap. “We haven’t been seeing the same level of consistency as a team and, with Stage 4 starting, we decided to make the tough call to bring Teej back and improve upon where we last left off with him.”
Huke returns to the bench on a different roster
Huke was one of the hottest free agents after he was removed from the Dallas Empire. When LA Thieves picked him up it was seen as an instant upgrade from TJHaly, despite his accolades. Even with an alleged upgrade, the team did not flow the same way they had without Huke on the roster. According to JKap, that is the reason why the team decided to revert to the previous iteration of the roster.
Our #LAThieves starting roster going into Stage 4 will be:@Kuavo
@Drazah_@Vxnxm@TJHaLy
Huke will be moved to sub for this week. pic.twitter.com/LDB46y4xRi— LA Thieves (@LAThieves) May 25, 2021
LA Thieves play one match during the OpTic Chicago home series on Saturday, May 29, against the Seattle Surge. The Seattle Surge recently made a roster change of their own after Jacob “Decemate” Cato removed himself from the team.
