The tale of the San Francisco versus Los Angeles sports rivalry traces back to the 60’s when baseball migrated west when the Dodgers and Giants moved to LA and SF respectively. Fast forward 50+ years, add some computers, and add a less physical, but just as (if not more) mentally taxing game – and you have the newest installation of the classic rivalry: The San Francisco Shock against the Los Angeles Valiant. If there’s any doubt of the venom between these two cities and their sports, remember a few years ago when a Dodgers fan was stabbed and killed by a Giants fan after a game? That’s how serious these two cities can be.

Pregame hopes, dreams, and fears: I hope and dream the Shock win, but I fear that the Shock will not take a single point.

Match review:

The first two games in Dorado had a pretty similar story: LA showing up and handing Frisco their butts on attack, but the Shock coming back and making some really good plays, but not quite getting there. Agilities of the Valiant was the MVP for me on the Genji specifically. Babybay of the Shock was the X-Factor. He started out really well, Valiant eventually figured out how to deal with him and he almost became a non-factor in the second round of Dorado.

The majority of the reason Babybay fell into being a non-factor is because of SF’s passive play style, or “anti-dive” as they described it themselves in the preseason. They relied heavily on a “protect the cowboy” strategy on the Dorado map and that did not end up doing so hot. The dive meta just seems to supersede SF’s passively style of play and the Dorado map really showed that.

The Temple of Anubis was the story of Valiant’s SoOn and his Widowmaker who REALLY showed up with a lot of clutch picks and PICKING up the MVP for the match. See what I did there? Pretty clever, right? The Shock had a VALIANT effort (there I go again, CAN’T STOP ME!) but ultimately could not take point B.

Ilios is one of the maps that The Shock has excelled at, particularly Dhak on his signature Lucio. The Shock had previously beaten LA in Ilios when they played during the preseason. Before the game Silkthread subbed in for Agilities. The Shock took the point initially in round 1, but then Valiant came in, took the point back and never looked back taking all maps of Ilios CONVINCINGLY to sock it to all of the people saying that Shock was going to win that map.

In Numbani, the story seemed all too familiar, more Valiant domination much to this San Francisco natives dismay. San Francisco was seemingly having trouble keeping track of their opponents ultimates, which was one of the big points of the match, but was felt particularly on Numbani. The Shock finally got the payload going in overtime and looked to start their comeback, but it was short lived as Valiant’s talent was too much for the Shock to handle and SF takes the loss for the round without pushing the payload to point B.

Moving to Valiant being on attack, they took the point on their second push and they payload never stopped except for a small stall 1 meter from their goal and then Envy brought out the BM Bastion and spelled defeat for San Francisco. Final score – Valiant 4, Shock 0.

While this loss does not inspire a lot of confidence for Shock fans, they do have hope with the arrival of Mr. 150K, “Sinatraa”, as well as “super” once they turn 18 a little bit later in the season, both of these players are game changers, and I could write for hours about them, but that’s an article for another time.

You can’t help but feel like San Francisco started off strong, but kept getting more and more tilted and lost more and more confidence as the match went on, one could say that it’s week 1 jitters, which could play a role, but it’s more likely that these guys are human, and no one likes losing as hard as they did.

My overall impression of the first ever regular season game: Los Angeles Valiant is very good and you can tell these guys have a lot of synergy and really have a love of playing the game, and playing the game together. Not to say that the Shock don’t, but the attitude is very prevalent with Valiant.

Check out our interview with Los Angeles Valiant’s Verbo to hear more about their teamwork strategies and goals for the season. And follow us on Twitter for more League updates!