[Update #2]: I have some excellent news to share! The Brother's War expansion will be massively increasing the amount of Rare and Mythic cards given to players!
[Update]: MTG Arena's big artifact focused expansion The Brother's War is launching on November 15th.
Given the prevalence of black decks throughout the Standard metagame ever since Sheoldred, the Apocalypse popped up with the Dominaria United set, it was only a matter of time before the color got smacked by the banhammer. What might come as quite as surprise, however, is that Wizards of the Coast has decided to only hit a single card - The Meathook Massacre!
"As is often the case, the Standard card pool rotation with the release of Dominaria United caused quite a shakeup, with cards from the new set finding their places into decks, and many of last year's cards shifting context within the new metagame," explains the brief update. "As the format has settled into place, the color black has proven powerful and prolific, and makes up the foundation of many of the top decks."
"To provide a small push against the color black's play rate among competitive decks, we're choosing to ban one black card. We discussed several different options, as no single black card stood out as a major power outlier played by all decks containing black. Ultimately, we decided that banning The Meathook Massacre was the best choice, as it's one of the most powerful black cards in the format, is especially powerful against specific archetypes (decks relying on a lot of small creatures), and has had its time to shine in Standard for over a year."
As far as I'm concerned this is a perfectly reasonable ban as The Meathook Massacre has been one of the most powerful and omnipresent board wipes since the moment it first arrived. Removing it from the equation should significantly weaken black decks against go-wide strategies, while still keeping its numerous deck archetypes relevant given that immensely powerful cards like the aforementioned Sheoldred, Tenacious Underdog and Invoke Despair are all still playable.
Much like the previous bans, crafting four copies of The Meathook Massacre before the update goes live on October 13th, 2022 is highly recommended since you will be refunded in wildcards. In other words, by crafting it now you'll basically get free copies of The Meathook Massacre to play around with in older formats.
The final thing worth mentioning is that today's announcement arrived alongside yet another ban, though this time around for the Modern format. Unsurprisingly, the banned card is Yorion, Sky Nomad as it not only provided a bit too much value, but it was also annoying to play with and against due to how much it could slow down the game.
You can read all about these bans, as well as keep an eye on any future announcements, over at the MTG website. Enjoy!