Late Sunday evening, the Dallas Fuel announced that Main Tank “xQc” was being released from the team. The seemingly inevitable move caps off a wild week of drama where it became clear that a move needed to be made.
Dallas Fuel Announce Release of Félix "xQc" Lengyel https://t.co/3rb1cPQsqF
— Dallas Fuel (@DallasFuel) March 12, 2018
Coming into the inaugural season of the Overwatch League, the Fuel were seen as one of the league’s top teams. Many observers, including myself, believed that they were probably the best of the Western teams and they had the best chance to knock off the all-Korean squads.
xQc was expected to play a large role as Dallas’ main tank, but controversy has surrounded the player since the first matches of the season. After getting swept 4-0 by the Houston Outlaws in Week 2 of Stage 1, xQc went on his stream and made disparaging remarks about Houston’s tank “Muma“. The Overwatch League wanted to set a precedent that this type of behavior was not to be tolerated and banned xQc for four matches and fined him $2,000.
Dallas went even further, announcing that xQc would be suspended for the rest of Stage 1 in order to curb this type of behavior in the future.
Before our match begins, we would like to issue this statement regarding @overwatchleague's decision to suspend @xQc. #burnblue pic.twitter.com/26ffHaPPEz
— Dallas Fuel (@DallasFuel) January 20, 2018
Coming into Stage 2, it looked like everything was fine between the player and the team on the surface. However, about a week ago rumors started to flare that there was internal dissension within the team following two straight losses. The floodgates opened after the team was surprisingly swept 3-0 by the San Francisco Shock, with xQc posting this cryptic tweet shortly after the defeat:
I single-handedly ruined this team
— xQc (@xQc) March 8, 2018
Over the last few days, xQc left the Fuel little choice after disparaging Overwatch League announcers and then doubling down with more bad behavior on his stream.
Later in the day, Dallas announced that it had added a new Main Tank in “OGE”, and it was clear that a decision had been made regarding xQc’s future with the team.
ROSTER ANNOUNCEMENT! Please welcome Son "OGE" Min-Seok to the team! Previously a tank main for CONBOX, we anticipate @OGE_ow to start playing in Stage 3. #OWL2018 #BurnBlue🔥💙 pic.twitter.com/KjbKiX9sY8
— Dallas Fuel (@DallasFuel) March 8, 2018
Dallas is hoping that the move will help the team focus on winning games again. There is still quite a bit of talent on the roster, especially at the DPS position, but the Fuel have a long way to climb in order to make it to the playoffs at the end of the season. Dallas is currently sitting at 5-11 almost a third of the way through the season.
