Call of Duty League 2020 season opener.
Call of Duty League 2020 season opener.
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Call of Duty League enjoys an esports rebirth with opening weekend

  • Posted byby Dean Takahashi
  • Updated
  • 2 min

The death of Kobe Bryant forced the Call of Duty League to cancel a shootout between a couple of NBA stars, as a sign of respect for the fallen basketball legend. But most of the opening weekend for the Call of Duty League went off without a hitch, based on what I’ve seen watching it from afar.

For this year’s Call of Duty League, Activision Blizzard has reimagined the competition based on the city-like structure of the successful Overwatch League, with teams rooted in local communities as a way of building long-term loyalties and rivalries among teams and fans.

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Written by

Dean Takahashi

Dean Takahashi is editorial director for GamesBeat. He has been a tech journalist since 1988, and he has covered games as a beat since 1996. He was lead writer for GamesBeat at VentureBeat from 2008 to April 2025. Prior to that, he wrote for the San Jose Mercury News, the Red Herring, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, and the Dallas Times-Herald. He is the author of two books, "Opening the Xbox" and "The Xbox 360 Uncloaked." He organizes the annual GamesBeat Next, GamesBeat Summit and GamesBeat Insider Series: Hollywood and Games conferences and is a frequent speaker at gaming and tech events. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.