As of this moment, teams in the Overwatch League are restructuring. This includes the Shanghai Dragons, who just announced that they have released five players from their roster. These players include Se-yeon “Geguri” Kim, Min-seong “diem” Bae, Jin-hyeok “DDing” Yang, Seong-hyeon “Luffy” Yang, and Weida “Diya” Lu. Surprisingly, after the conclusion of an amazing season, the Dragons are still looking to improve.
A letter from our GM Van pic.twitter.com/4MygEC8SMo
— Shanghai Dragons (@ShanghaiDragons) October 26, 2020
The end of an era
This news must surprise older Dragons fans. Even with their great team, their performance in the Grand Finals weekend showed they still needed to grow. Importantly, these five players had all of their contracts expiring for this next season, but the team released them all. For some players, this outcome was inevitable. Ever since her play in the winless Shanghai Dragons season, Geguri didn’t play for almost all of the next two seasons. Also, Shanghai assigned Diya to their academy team in China. Luffy, however, didn’t get much playing time in this past season.
Yet, the two most surprising releases are DPS players Diem and DDing. Both of these players were hyped up when signed in the second season, and led Shanghai to a tournament win over the San Francisco Shock. In that tourney, DDing was crucial to the win with his Pharah play. But, in this past season, they didn’t play often. It’s clear now that their starting DPS for next season are 2020 MVP Byung-sun “Fleta” Kim and star rookie Jae-won “LIP” Lee. And, if there is one thing good players want, it is game time. Over this past season, the Shanghai Dragons noticed that keeping Diem and DDing here wasn’t a good idea for either side, and released them.
A new beginning
As for these new free agents, they all have opportunity to sign to a new team. Being on a great team such as Shanghai adds value, even if you weren’t constantly starting. Both Geguri and Luffy are bigger risks due to playing time, but Geguri has a massive fan following. Either way, both DDing and Diem have a great upside if played well. Alas, this also means the only survivor of the original Shanghai Dragons on the roster is Eui-Seok “Fearless” Lee. While his comeback tale has been amazing, the team needs to change. If they want to win like San Francisco Shock did, they need to adapt on the fly.
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