The Call of Duty League (CDL) season is about to start roaring as the first Major of the season is upon us in Madrid. For the first time since 2019, the CDL will go overseas for a Major and it will be a great weekend of COD. With the bracket locked in and teams flying over this week, who are some of the dark horse squads that could see themselves in the top four or even have a chance at a win in Madrid? The format will be starting with the most likely squads to make a run to the least likely the further down we go.
The Ultra is in an interesting scenario. They are a superb search-and-destroy (SnD) team but struggle with hardpoint (HP) and control (CTL). While they finished as the third-seed squad for the major, their opening season schedule wasn’t the strongest, as their toughest match was their last one against OpTic Texas, who is the one-seed. Toronto started the year beating up a FaZe team that was supremely behind the curve at the start and then faced a ton of the teams in the middle of the pack. The squad would then have three game fives against the likes of the Minnesota RØKKR, Miami Heretics, and Vancouver Surge.
As it stands right now, the best way for them to make a deep run is to “Neslo” other teams. The term “Neslo” is to win a series through games two, three, and five dropping both hardpoints. On paper, this squad has all the talent to make a run, but they need Tobias “CleanX” Juul Jønsson and Ben “Beans” McMellon to kick into high gear in respawn modes to carry this team through the bracket. As the old Call of Duty League adage goes “SnD wins championships” and the Toronto Ultra is the best SnD team to start the year.
No one saw this happening this year after the season Boston Breach had last year. Now they are firmly the gatekeepers between the top five and everyone else. The roster consists of some CDL castoffs and frontman Eric “Snoopy” Perez. Snoopy has had a huge development spike with Black Ops 6 as he is a sneaky good MVP pick if the Breach can breach the top four after a couple of years of showing sparks of potential with some bad mistakes. This team is good in hardpoint and .500 in SnD so that should be good enough to go deep into the bracket, but they drew the short straw for their first matchup.
As the four seed, the Breach has to face FaZe to start their Major so they have to come out firing. Now, it isn’t the end all be all if they lose to FaZe as they would drop to face Cloud9 in the losers bracket. That is where their tournament fully starts because this team is going to be a losers bracket run squad. For that to work they need Cameron “Cammy” McKilligan and Joseph “Owakening” Conley to step up a little more to help the dynamic young SMG’s on this team.
It isn’t often that a team gets to play from home that isn’t OpTic, but the Spaniards of the Miami Heretics get to make some noise for their home. Similar to the Boston Breach, the Heretics also drew the short straw as their tournament starts against rivals OpTic Texas. If the Heretics lose that match they will dip down to the loser’s bracket to face the LA Guerrilla M8’s who have looked good recently. This squad is powered by Jose “ReeaL” Castilla and early Rookie of the Year candidate David “RenKoR” Isern. The issue with them having a deep run is their map pool being really small.
For every map and mode, they are only good at Red Card HP (2-0), Skyline HP (3-1), Protocol SnD (2-0), and Vault CTL (4-1). That is bad due to the picks and vetos system as teams will veto most of those maps and pick things like Hacienda CTL, Vault HP, and Vault SnD. The Heretics are a combined 1-9 on those three maps and modes. If the team is to make a deep run they desperately need to expand their map pool and get more production from Alejandro “Lucky” Lopez and Adrian “MettalZ” Serrano.
This RØKKR squad is going to be agents of chaos in this tournament if they make a deep run. In the power rankings after Minor I, they were this writer’s sixth-best team due to their clutch factor and driving teams to game fives. Their roster is filled with agents of chaos as well because they are a bunch of guys who have a ton of potential but have a ton of boom-and-bust performances. The team is headlined by Justice “Estreal” McMillan who is another young gun that has been great this year.
This squad had a tough road to this Major as they had to face the top five teams five times and they lost all of them. The RØKKR also had some bad losses to Cloud9 and Vancouver Surge in which they had chances to win but didn’t. Similar to the Heretics above, their map pool isn’t very wide, specifically in respawn modes.
In HP’s, they are good at Hacienda and Vault going a combined 6-1, however, they are 1-12 on every other HP. In CTL, they are 4-1 on Vault and 1-4 on Protocol. Their strength lies in their SnD map pool as they win on everything except Protocol and Red Card. For a deep run to happen for this squad they need Dylan “Nero” Koch to put on a show and play as “Nero the Hero,” and they desperately need Paul “PaulEhx” Avila to step up his production or he might be on the chopping block.
That does it for the potential dark horse squads that will make noise at the first Major of the season. The Major broadcasts begin on Thursday, January 30 on the CDL youtube channel at 8:30 am. If you are looking for a full schedule to see your favorite team or one of the ones listed in this article the CDL website has the full bracket with times available.
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