Photo By Jonah Jamroz
Feature Coverage by Robert Jensen
The National Xball League’s Chicago Open
was held at the beautiful Gaelic Park in Oak
Forest, IL, just a short drive from downtown
Chicago. This oasis in the middle of busy-
town USA is a green, lush hidden gem and
the ideal place for this event. Airports, hotels,
restaurants and entertainment were all close
by. The park itself offered plenty of green
grass fields, tons of parking and room for the
rolling show that is the NXL. As always, the
event had a great trade show with all of the
games major industry players on hand.
The Games
As per usual, Edmonton Impact sits atop the
leaderboard for the pro 2018 NXL season
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coming into this event. Impact has been a
runaway train the past three-plus seasons,
just dominating the division, gaining the
early rankings lead and keeping it. This year
has been no different thus far as Impact has
two first place and one second place finish
in three events. It’s literally been years since
Impact has not made it to the semifinals, and
way more often than not they have made it to
and won in the finals. This year Houston Heat,
ac: Dallas, San Diego Dynasty, San Antonio
X-Factor and Moscow Red Legion have all
play very well, keeping Impact on their toes
and paying attention. That said, it would
take an enormous drop in any one event for
Impact to open the door for someone else to
walk through. Spoiler alert: You may want to
read the rest of this article.