Among all of the teams to have played in Overwatch League, the London Spitfire are the most frustrating to spectate. The reason is because of the latent potential that it has within its depths. This team combined the talents of two of the best pre-Overwatch League teams in KongDoo Panthera and GC Busan. We saw that incredible potential unleashed in the first two stages of Overwatch League. Then we saw the squandered brilliance of that lineup in the latter stages of Overwatch League. Like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the London Spitfire have two faces, Dr. London and Mr. Spitfire.

We saw Mr. Spitfire in the first two stages of Overwatch League when they were still contending for the best team in the league. Their peak in the first stage is arguably the highest we’ve seen of any team in Overwatch League. While New York Excelsior had the better score in the overall stage. However London Spitfire were the team people remembered as they ran through the gauntlet. They beat Houston Outlaws 3-1 and then faced off against New York Excelsior and won 3-2.

In that moment, it felt like there were going to be two behemoths in the league. Two titans that surpassed all other teams and battle for the title of the best team in the Overwatch League. That promise continued into the second stage where they got second place in the round robin portion, but were upset by the Philadelphia Fusion’s aggression in the title stage matches.

Once we get into stage three and four however, the problems started to rise. Mr. Spitfire became Dr. London. A team that was a murderous beast became a docile man. A team questioning their identity and their place within the Overwatch League. From game to game, they continued to baffle analysts with strange substitutions as they moved away from the successful core of the earlier stages. While they could still have good execution at times, it was never as consistent as earlier on. In the end, they were left in the dust as New York Excelsior continued to be the goliath of the league and London Spitfire squandered their potential with a seeming lack of leadership and strange roster issues.

By the end of stage four, they seemed to have realized their mistakes as they removed everyone except the players that had brought them success. The players that stayed on included: Ji-hyeok ‘birdring’ Kim, Jun-young ‘Profit’ Park, Jun-ho ‘Fury’ Kim, Jae-hui ‘Gesture’ Hong, Won-sik ‘Closer’ Jung, Seung-tae ‘Bdosin’ Choi, and Jong-seok ‘NUS’ Kim.

Man for man this was arguably the strongest team in the league. Birdring has been hailed as one of the most talented players in the entire league and realistically speaking, he was probably the weakest link in the chain. However that incredible potential was never realized again. Profit is the most underrated DPS player in the League and arguably a top 3 player overall. Gesture and Fury are an incredible tank pair with Gesture arguably the best tank in the league. Closer, NUS, and Bdosin are some of the best support players we’ve seen.

With the core set, it should have been a lock. However the lack of cohesion and leadership could not be solved by individual prowess alone. They could never figure out the meta nor could they figure out how to change their compositions mid match. By the end of stage four, they ended with a 4-6 record, fourth worst in the rankings. Overall, they were a team that was less than the sum of its parts.

This was the team we saw on the first day of playoffs as they got smashed by the L.A. Gladiators 3-0 in the first day of playoffs. While L.A. Gladiators probably surprised them with some of their prepared strategies and change in lineup from Chan-hyung ‘Fissure’ Baek to Luis ‘iRemiix’ Galarza Figueroa, it didn’t account for the dismal performance of the day. The weak and incoherent Dr. London came out that day and it looked over for the team.

The rematch was set for July 14th, three days after their initial meeting. This time the story was completely different as it wasn’t Dr. London, but Mr. Spitfire that came to the fore. It was a resurrection of everything that made the London Spitfire so great in the early stages of Overwatch League. Whatever problems they had seemed to be fixed. Whatever mental issues, teamplay issues, or leadership issues there were before all just disappeared. It was an incredible transformation from two days prior. Their individual play, execution, and team play finally showed up.

On that day, London Spitfire, they didn’t just beat the L.A. Gladiators, they destroyed them. It was a masterful display of the skill we know they were capable of. It was a clean sweep the entire way through as they won 3-0 in both series and broke their head-to-head record against the L.A. Gladiators (albeit one without Fissure).

For every other team in the League, this spells trouble. While we don’t know if London Spitfire can consistently pull out this level of performance, they have finally proven for the first time in a long time that they can reach their insane potential. If that is the case, we have another potential championship contender coming in for the playoffs.

On the flipside of that, they have also proven themselves to have the lowest low among all of the potential teams remaining in the playoffs. We have seen their first best-of-five against L.A. Gladiators where they didn’t even put up a fight. We then saw them return to peak strength in the subsequent best-of-fives.

The London Spitfire are the Dr. Jeykll and Mr. Hyde of the playoffs. If the incoherent Dr. London shows up, then they will be easy prey for the L.A. Valiant. If the dominant Mr. Spitfire shows up, this team has the ability to win the entire league. These are the two faces of the London Spitfire, the biggest wildcard in the League.

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