It was revealed just ahead of the CDL 2024 season that a transition from a multistream format to a YouTube-exclusive broadcast had been locked in. This meant that the Call of Duty League would be bidding farewell to Twitch, arguably the home of esports streaming, much to the chagrin of the COD community. However, out of the back of that news, it has been revealed that ZooMaa’s ‘The Flank’ and Scump’s ‘The Breakdown’ are prohibited from streaming CDL content on Twitch.
This is a huge blow to the competitive Call of Duty community, and it has reportedly gone so far that these podcasts have been threatened with closure action. For the last year or so, Scump and ZooMaa’s podcasts have attracted almost more viewers than the core streams broadcasted by the Call of Duty League. They’re housed on Twitch, though – and as a result of this exclusivity deal, they’re effectively banned from streaming CDL content on their podcasts at YouTube’s behest.
Paying The Price of Exclusivity
It’s simple. If YouTube has paid a lot of money to secure the exclusive broadcast rights for the CDL, why would it want Scump or ZooMaa’s podcasts, which have tens of thousands of viewers, to stream that content on Twitch? It’s taking some of the monetisation potential away from YouTube, and sadly, the retired Call of Duty pro players don’t have a leg to stand on. They can’t break the rules, especially given their close association with Call of Duty and Activision Blizzard.
For many Call of Duty fans, moving the core broadcast away from Twitch was a sorely misguided step. Last season, the COD League Major III tournament pulled in a peak viewership count of 335,170, making it the single-most popular CDL event in history. That was mostly due to the OpTic Texas vs. Toronto Ultra Grand Final series, but it’s worth noting that the lion’s share of that viewership was recorded on Twitch.
This weekend, the CDL 2024 season kicked off, and viewership has been struggling to break above a 70,000 peak concurrent count.
Will The Flank and The Breakdown Close?
From what ZooMaa said on his stream, it seems as though his show, The Flank, and Scump’s podcast, The Breakdown, will only face legal action if they stream CDL content. It doesn’t matter if that content is from the past or the present – they just cannot show it.
It’s unlikely the podcasts will be impacted any other way, but it’s a big hit to production value. There’s something especially entertaining about watching some of the best COD players in history break down gameplay from today’s rising stars and veteran competitors. But, thanks to that exclusivity deal with YouTube, that’s fast becoming a thing of the past.
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