Los Angeles Valiant vs Los Angeles Gladiators

For our last match of the day we have very interesting match between two Los Angeles teams - the Valiant and the Gladiators.

The Valiant have been playing incredibly well after their 0-4 loss at the hands of Seoul in the first week of stage 2.

The biggest and perhaps most important change that they made is swapping Kariv from the support role to DPS. Now he was first a DPS main back in his APEX days, however it was unknown how well he would perform against top tier opposition. The answer is - incredibly well. What this does for the Valiant is that it enables Soon to focus more on his Tracer play, now that he has a top tier long rang hit-scan player. The Soon we've seen from the last two weeks was a dominant, aggressive one and that was missing when he had to play with Agilities or Grimreality/Silkthread. The Valiant now have a DPS duo that is perfectly suited for the current meta, along with a fantastic tank duo and a very capable support duo in Unkoe and Verbo.

The last we've seen of the Valiant was a strong 3-1 showing against the Dallas Fuel. After a quick take of point A on Hanamura, Dallas failed to do anything else. Soon was consistently taking out their backline (especially Harryhook on Mercy) When the Valiant were on the offensive however it was Kariv that did the heavy lifting, ending their 2-0 attack with ten eliminations and zero deaths. (60% accuracy) They effectively shut down the entire Dallas roster, and it transferred over to Nepal as well, with Soon causing a ton of chaos paired along with Fate and Envy.

There is quite a lot of hype behind the Valiant right now, however it has to be noted that they didn't really face any top tier opposition. They lost to Seoul - and it wasn't even close and they managed to best Dallas, Shanghai and San Francisco - three of the bottom four teams. That's not exactly something to be incredibly excited about as they did what they were supposed to do, and that is beat the teams behind them in the standings.

This match however should be no different.

The Gladiators have started off the second stage of the regular season much like the first one - inconsistently. While the addition of Fissure from the Spitfire gave this team a much needed boost in consistency and overall tank play, it's just not enough. The rest of the team has to step up and put in the work as they're currently fairly mediocre, the definition of a middle-of-the-pack team.

The last we've seen of the Gladiators was a 3-1 loss against Seoul Dynasty just a couple of days ago. They started off strong on Hanamura point A, with Hydration having a couple of good moments on Genji and Roadhog. They then proceeded to bait out a couple of key ultimates out of Seoul right before point B, however Seoul managed to weather to storm and actually full hold the second point even though LA had the upper hand. The situational awareness from Seoul was unparalleled and the Gladiators couldn't match. Nepal was a different story however as they adapted better and won the first point 100% to 99%. They continued on to the second point as well, as Fleta didn't swap from Soldier even though he was getting heavily focused by the Gladiators. That strong showing allowed the Gladiators to stay undefeated on Nepal, even against the mighty Dynasty.

But their elation didn't last for long as they failed to replicate their success on Hollywood and Watchpoint: Gibraltar. Hollywood was a particular treat as Fleta went for Doomfist - a sight rarely seen and utterly demolished the Gladiators in Seoul's attack. They adapted more quickly and made the right swaps when it was necessary. Overall the Gladiators played well but not as well as they could. Hydration was hot and cold once again and Surefour just wasn't that good. This roster remains an enigma with a solid skill ceiling that they're simply not reaching right now.

That said both Los Angeles squads always find a way to entertain, so this should be a very fun and engaging scrap to watch, with or without the LA rivalry.

While the Valiant have the edge, the Gladiators never roll over and surrender. It will also be a fun opportunity to see the Soon + Kariv DPS duo back in action. They're a very capable duo, that's for sure but the sample size is still rather small.