We’ve spoken at length about Overwatch League sponsors over the last week. Quite a few sponsors have been stepping back from OWL and CDL, thanks to the recent lawsuit Blizzard is facing right now. Between the major lawsuit, and a potential shareholder lawsuit, sponsors don’t want anything to do with that kind of negative heat. This news in particular comes as a direct result of the sexual harassment and discrimination lawsuit Blizzard is dealing with. Sure, Blizzard has pledged to make serious changes, and people have begun stepping down, that isn’t enough yet.

So far, T-Mobile, Coca-Cola, and State Farm have all stepped back from the Overwatch League as sponsors. State Farm is reevaluating, and Coca-Cola announced they are “taking a step back.” As far as T-Mobile goes, they simply have had their logo and branding removed from Overwatch League and CDL events as one of the sponsors. Perhaps one of the biggest blows to the Overwatch League right now is the step back from Kellogg.  

This is an interesting move, as Kellogg is known for many things, but in particular, Luci-Ohs. As a part of the Kellogg and Blizzard partnership that began in 2019, Kellogg produced the Luci-Ohs cereal. Known for a wide variety of snack and breakfast foods like Cheeze-It Grooves and Pringle’s Wavy (both of which had Overwatch League branding/Overwatch imagery), an official statement says they’re stepping back:

“We find these allegations troubling and inconsistent with our commitment to equity, diversity and inclusion. While Activision Blizzard has announced plans to address the challenging issues it faces, we will not be moving forward with any new programs this year, but will continue to review progress made against their plans.”

Kellogg makes a good point though. Words are well and good, but people are likely waiting to see actual change and growth. As of last Friday, the Overwatch League sponsors/partners page no longer features either of Kellogg’s products. The way things stand right now, the Overwatch League has three “official” partners left: Xfinity, Coca-Cola, and Teamspeak. As Xfinity owns an Overwatch Team (Philadelphia Fusion, via Comcast), it’s not likely they will be parting ways as sponsors. Coca-Cola is “stepping back”, but they’re still listed on the partner page.

We don’t want to doom and gloom or gloat about Blizzard’s misfortunes. It is important for the company to fix the problems they’ve let go uncheck for years though. These sponsors could come back to the Overwatch League in the future, once the company has cleaned up its act.