OWL hands out fines as four players face Disciplinary Action

The Overwatch League has had a busy start to the week as they’ve taken disciplinary action against four different players including Taimou, TaiRong, SilkThread and xQc in unrelated incidents.

Double grief for Dallas

This week was a clear showing of force from the Overwatch League as they’ve taken action across the board over a variety of player related disciplinary issues. Back in January, Timo ‘Taimou’ Kettunen faced criticism for using a homophobic slur during his stream. Since the incident occurred, Taimou has apologized for his actions, regardless of that fact the OWL has fined the Dallas Fuel player $1000 for his conduct.

Another Dallas Fuel player found himself on the wrong side of a OWL hearing yet again as Felix ‘xQc’ Lengyel has been reprimanded for spamming an emote in a ‘racially disparaging manner’ in an Overwatch League’s stream chat. This repeated offense has to have been taken into account as he’s received a four-game suspension that begins on March 12th, effectively taking him out of action for the season once again.

At this point, xQc’s liability as a ‘suspension prone’ player has to follow his reputation a bit as his inability to stay level headed for a full Stage of play has kept him from showing his consistency with the Dallas Fuel. Even though xQc hasn’t been the most impactful player, robbing your team of flexibility in the tank role is not an ideal strategy with so little room for error in these tight games on a weekly basis.

Part of the Agreement

One of the disciplinary actions that were handed out did not belong to a player, but a coach as Houston Outlaws’ Kim ‘TaiRong’ Tae-yeong was issued a warning for posting an offensive meme on his social media. Before the hearing, TaiRong donated a $1000 charitable donation to the Hiroshima Peace Culture Foundation as a self-punishment for his actions that gave him the warning instead of the fines and/or suspensions of the other cases.

The other disciplinary action taken on by the OWL was focused on Los Angeles Valiant’s SilkThread as he was fined $1000 for account sharing. According to Blizzard’s statement, Ted ‘SilkThread’ Wang committed an act that was forbidden in the End User License Agreement, which led to his punishment. Whether it’s hate speech or License infractions, Blizzard personnel made it clear in their closing statement that behavior like this would not be tolerated in any capacity, and dishing out these punishments in a public manner makes the process inclusive to players and fans alike as Blizzard works to bring transparency to the entire community.

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