Toronto Defiant release head coach Bishop

Bishop has been "relieved of duties," according to the team.

Photo by Robert Paul via Blizzard Entertainment
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Just weeks before the end of the Overwatch League regular season, the Toronto Defiant have released head coach Lee “Bishop” Beomjun, according to a team statement.

With Bishop departing, the rest of the coaching staff will take over coaching responsibilities for the remainder of the season. Newly-hired assistant coach Matthew “Optidox” Sims, assistant coach Shim “Mobydik” Sungbo, and analyst Dennis “Barroi” Matz will be assuming head coach duties during the final weeks of the regular season.

This is a sudden announcement from the Defiant, who have gone through a transition period during the middle of the Overwatch League season. Toronto started the season with a full Korean roster but gradually added more Western players as the season progressed. The pickups of Andreas “Logix” Berghmans, Liam “Mangachu” Campbell, and Daniel “gods” Graeser have particularly benefited the team as the Overwatch League instituted role lock in stage four.

Bishop served as the coach of the London Spitfire in 2018, but he left the team before their inaugural season championship run. He also coached former Overwatch teams Cloud9 and Cloud9 KongDoo.

The Toronto Defiant next play the Florida Mayhem on Aug. 8 at 9:30pm CT.

Update Aug. 7, 10:50pm CT: Bishop has released a statement on Twitter saying that he is parting ways with the Defiant. He says that he will “take a little break and pursue alternate career opportunities” at this time.

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Liz Richardson
Liz is a freelance writer and editor from Chicago. Her favorite thing is the Overwatch League; her second favorite thing is pretending iced coffee is a meal. She specializes in educational content, patch notes that (actually) make sense, and aggressively supporting Tier 2 Overwatch. When she's not writing, Liz is expressing hot takes on Twitter and making bad life choices at Target.