Overwatch League Rumors: myKL, Dafran Feed the Hype Machine

During the Overwatch League offseason, speculation and rumors abound. In a major franchise league with millions of dollars and Venture Capitalist partners at the table, players are treated like Pokémon cards at a middle school lunch table, traded or lost in the shuffle. Some may choose to change teams or want to get transferred, while others want to stay with their current roster. It isn't up to them; their livelihood could be traded away in an instant without their input.

One of the largest Overwatch League rumor mongers is myKL, a former Contenders player turned YouTuber. Last week, myKL posted a video claiming the manager of the Washington D.C. branch of the OWL, Kate Mitchell, was making offers to players to join the squad and later rescinding them. The video spread like wildfire among Overwatch fans, with many on reddit and Twitter taking myKL's words as fact. Mitchell disputed the claim and D.C. put out a statement that "the situation has been mischaracterized."

In the aftermath of all of that heat, myKL posted a twitlonger saying he will post only "100 (percent) info" going forward. "I don't want to cause any problems for players over rumors," myKL wrote. "It was absolutely stupid of me to tweet that and I never will again." That same day, he tweeted that Overwatch streamer Daniel "Dafran" Francesca would join Atlanta's Overwatch League team. In order for Dafran to compete, he would have to be approved by Blizzard; he was suspended in July of 2017 from Overwatch Contenders for streaming controversial content and trolling in games.

Over the past few days, myKL has claimed Dafran has been approved and will be joining the Atlanta team. Dafran has denied this on stream, saying "you guys really think I'd join the Overwatch League? Fucking dumbasses." Dafran refused to elaborate but did call myKL his "little pawn" later on stream. Dexerto, a site that's like TMZ for influencers, has already fallen for the bait and posted two stories; one confirming myKL and one confirming Dafran.

We won't know if these rumors are true until Atlanta makes an official announcement about their roster. MyKL might be completely wrong, blowing another situation out of proportion because of a "rumor" he's heard. If Darfran does join Atlanta, myKL looks like a prophet. If he doesn't, it was just a rumor anyways.

Rumors have hurt players' reputations in the past. Baek "Fissure" Chan-hyung started out on the London Spitfire, before being traded over to the LA Gladiators. In an Overwatch League Watchpoint video, Fissure said "I got the call about being traded out of the blue. I was traded to Gladiators, I wasn't too happy." In July, weeks into the fourth stage of the OWL, online news monger Slasher wrote on Twitter that the player was under performing and wanted to switch to an all-Korean roster. Fissure denied these claims and stayed with the Gladiators for the rest of the inaugural season of the League.

When trades for season two were allowed, Fissure was traded to Seoul Dynasty, a move Slasher had predicted. At the beginning, Fissure was committed to staying on the Gladiators, but when the opportunity for a trade to a team that communicated in a language he knew fluently, he didn't pass it up. Slasher boasted on Twitter about his prediction. Whether his source was right or not, Fissure still looks like a fool and Slasher comes out on top.

The drama surrounding rumors is often more impactful than their actual content. Users on subreddits like Competitive Overwatch and OverwatchTMZ eat up each new piece of Blizzard's franchised puzzle. The Overwatch League has been trying to copy the model of traditional sports like the NFL and NBA, and roster rumors are a huge part of that. If the Overwatch League players unionized, it could limit some of the fallback, but there's been little public traction on the movement.

For now, Overwatch pros remain subject to the whims of team owners, coaches and YouTube rumors that can shape their identity to a fan base that loves a juicy story.