After the flagship matchup between Chicago Huntsmen and OpTic Gaming Los Angeles, Hector ‘H3CZ’ Rodriguez has delved into why he didn’t watch both teams lock horns live.
The matchup between the ‘old OpTic’ (Chicago Huntsmen) and the ‘new OpTic’ (OGLA) was primed to be one for the ages, regardless of the outcome.
After a long-winded takeover process with Infinite Esports, H3CZ was edged out of the captain’s deck of his beloved OpTic Gaming. So the Call of Duty Esports aficionado took his talents to NRG, where he built his own franchise from scratch.
And of course, as fate would have it, Infinite Esports’ OpTic and H3CZ’ Huntsmen met in a thrilling five-game elimination match, to determine who would lock in the final place for the $3 million Championship Weekend.
H3CZ didn’t watch Huntsmen vs OpTic?
Speaking with CDL Commissioner, Johanna Faries, on Episode 69 of the Eavesdrop Podcast, H3CZ shed light on why he chose not to watch the two sides go head-to-head live.
“I wasn’t watching — I’ve got to be honest, I didn’t watch live,” Rodriguez opened. “Everybody knows that we’re taking precautions to make sure we’re as competitive as we possibly can be from that standpoint… But I wasn’t here, I knew the answer to the result tens of minutes ahead of the actual thing.
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“Nadeshot texted asking who won — I didn’t reply. BigTymer texted me — I didn’t reply. Everyone was texting me but I didn’t reply… I wanted them to go through the same angst that I would have (I didn’t) if that happened. And it was such a moment.”
Segment starts at 20:03 for mobile users.
There’s no doubt that both the former OpTic members will be thanking H3CZ for not spoiling the party, especially with just how down to the wire that final game was.
Players are currently playing their matches ahead of the broadcast schedule, after some incidents of players being hit offline during their matchups.
Naturally, this had a profound impact on competitive integrity during Call of Duty’s biggest esports event to-date. Meaning that Activision shifted match times to ensure a level playing field was maintained.