All roads in the Call of Duty League lead to the Championship weekend, where the top eight teams compete for the title of world champion. In 2026, the CDL Championship took place in glitzy Las Vegas, where high stakes meet the energy of the final event.
During CDL Championship 2026 in Las Vegas, Dot Esports sat down with the CDL casting icons Clint “Maven” Evans and Joseph “MerK” DeLuca to talk about what it’s like narrating the end of the competitive Call of Duty season.
“[It’s the] culmination of the entire year, but it’s more than that. It’s a culmination of careers. Like Shotzzy going for three, Simp going for three, OpTic going for back-to-back-to-back,” MerK said. “It’s as much about the money as just the prestige.”
Despite that, Maven said that the fact it’s the culmination of the season doesn’t affect his work as a caster. “I’m just personally 12 years in; I’m lucky that I love my job so much that it’s still just so fun for me. You think at some point I’d be like [burned] out, but it’s great.”
The only times when it can be hard to get into is when the matchups aren’t that great. Maven mentioned online matches with bad teams or early losers bracket games at Majors. “Someone’s just going to get their back blown out 3-0; it’s not gonna be competitive.”
At Champs, there are still occasional 3-0 series, like FaZe versus Falcons or Gentle Mates versus G2. But overall it’s a lot more competitive and exciting. “I’m more excited, so that makes my job easier. I’ve never been a good person at faking it. I don’t really have like a caster voice. If I’m genuinely excited, I’m excited. And Champs makes that easy,” Maven said.
In terms of prep, MerK highlighted the casters talk more to the teams and get the feel of what they’ve been working on. “There’s some unknowns, so we do our best to talk to coaches, talk to players. We may not do it as much throughout the year,” MerK said. “I go from practice room to practice room, just to get the vibe check.”
CDL Championship is about prestige, and while many follow the competition at home, there are some things a viewer won’t get to witness, such as true player emotion. “Obviously, you see it on stage after losses how disappointed they can be, but backstage you see the real emotion,” MerK said. “They kind of let everything out and just how much this matters to them.”
Every CDL event in every city has its own crowd and personality, especially this year with Birmingham and Paris. When it comes to Vegas, what stands out to Maven is consistency. “Last year was frustrating. I was maybe the saddest I’ve ever been when we showed up to Kitchener, and we had 100 people in the crowd day one,” Maven shared. It got better on Sunday, but compared to last year’s Champs, Vegas has been more consistent.
The grand final of CDL Champs 2026 was a rematch between OpTic and FaZe, the two teams that have been on another level this tournament. Regardless of the results, both MerK and Maven hope it’s one of the best grand finals of all time.
