2020 Rivals League

The 2020 Rivals League is the Rivals League played in the shortened 2020 Players Tour Season. It was the first season to feature a Rivals League.

History
Starting in August 2020, Magic: the Gathering’s Organized Play calendar moved away from seasons that follow the calendar year (the 2019 season) back to seasons that are split over multiple calendar years (the 2020–2021 season). But the 2019 season ended in December 2019, so in order to fill the gap between then and the beginning of the 2020–2021 season, the Magic Pro League held a shortened seven-month season. The MPL was reduced to a 24-player league with players able to earn up to $50,000 in appearance fees in addition to prizes earned at tournaments.

At the same time, the Rivals League was introduced, which essentially is a second division for the Esports. The Rivals League is a talent-development league that feeds the MPL. Rivals will make it into the MPL either through sustained success over the course of a season or through a new tournament called the MPL Gauntlet.

Because the 2020 partial season had fewer events, both MPL and Rivals players would make less than a full season. Rivals players could earn up to $15,000 in appearance fees, in addition to any prize money earned. Unlike the 2019 season, the 2020 Magic Pro League didn't have any kind of league play structure. Instead, members of both the Magic Pro and Rivals Leagues would compete for their places in the 2020–21 season by earning Player Points at Players Tours and Mythic Points at Mythic Invitationals, Mythic Qualifier Weekends, and Mythic Point Challenges.

The COVID-19 outbreak in January resulted in preventative measures taken in March. A large swath of the Grand Prix event schedule was canceled, and the Players Tour Finals Houston and the May Invitational were also canceled. By April, it was clear that further events were not safely feasible to hold, and Wizards wrote off the entire season as not salvageable. While some large events later in the year would be prospectively held, the events would not pay out points for League positions. Current Rivals and MPL players would hold their positions, with Tabletop players addedn from the top 4 players of the three Players Tour Series 1. The Arena ranked players with Mythic points would be decided after the season's Arena challenges.

As 2020 Partial Season Rivals maintained their league status for next season, those players were no longer be eligible to play in the three remaining Mythic Point awarding events (the April 4 Mythic Point Challenge, May 16 Mythic Qualifier Core Set 2021, and June 20 Mythic Qualifier Core Set 2021). All Rivals were to be invited to the October 22-25 Mythic Invitational – Zendikar Rising, which was the event these outstanding qualifiers would feed. This was later replaced by the Mythic Invitational 2020 (August 28–30, 2020). Other events, including the Players Tour Finals Minneapolis (July 10-12) and Mythic Invitational – Core 2021 (July 23-26), were cancelled.

Roster
For the shortened 2020 season, the Rivals League roster features 32 players. Participants were 2019's bottom twelve MPL players based on Mythic Points. The eight 2019 MTG Arena and eight tabletop highest ranked Challengers who were not invited to the MPL were also eligible. Their rankings were based on Mythic Points earned in the appropriate types of events. Four participants to the Rivals League were invited at Wizards of the Coast's discretion. This became six invites when two qualified people declined to participate.