Due to its oppressive effect on the Hearthstone meta, Pirate Warrior was deemed too strong to continue existing in its pre-18-0-2017 form by Blizzard. So a change was made and the nerfs hit one of Warrior's best early-game tools for controlling the board (or aggressing, in PW's case) - Fiery War Axe. Pirate Warrior instantly took a hit to both its popularity and winrate. The change worked. What it also did though, was kill any chance of Control Warrior participating in the competitive meta. Fiery War Axe was, as mentioned, (Control) Warrior's best tool for dealing with sticky early minions and surviving the constant onslaught of pirates. Any acceptable winrate players had completely tanked and the control version of this class completely died. This has continued for months and it's time to fix this mistake.

After the release of Patches the Pirate, aggro players received a great tool for winning the board early - a charging 1/1 token, that came out of your deck when you played your first pirate. This card would cement its place in every aggro deck made after its release along with at least 2 more pirates of the player's choice. Because of this, aggro players essentialy only needed to worry about 27 spots in their deck, instead of 30. Release of Knights of the Frozen Throne comes, and more problematic cards are released - a 2 mana deck-wide +1/+1 buff (it even came with a free 2/2 minion), a 5/5 "buff my shit up, fam", a 7 mana 4/4 + 4/4 with charge - and this neutral aggressive package took over the meta. The problem seemed obvious - Patches was way too strong and allowed you to win the board early, further enabling you to keep control of the board with the above-mentioned cards. A nerf was requested. Because Warrior was the one who best accomodated the pirates (it is in his class identity after all), Blizzard decided to do something about him. The changes were announced - 3 mana Axe, 4 mana frog. Patches, alive and well, continued to opress the meta - with the release of Kobolds and Catacombs, he gained even more loyal comrades - a 0 mana 5/5. After 2 more months of tyranny, Blizzard finally decided that Patches was a problem, and a nerf to Patches and some of the other aforementioned cards is finally due.

Blizzard confirmed that Patches was a mistake with their most recent nerf announcement. He has been warping the meta around him for a year and a half, making other cards look bad in the process. So we urge you now, Blizzard, revert the Fiery War Axe nerf. You let a mistake guide your design choices and balance decisions. And that is great, because we learn through each and every mistake. Now all that is left, is for Axe to be returned to us. Don't let an entire archetype die, because of a past error in judgement. 

Godspeed.