LoL Worlds 2025 – Wacky Superstitions #1

A list of all Worlds winning teams from 2014 – 2023. Picture found on Reddit.

The weather is cooling down, the leaves are changing colors, people are dragging out their Halloween decorations from their houses, and pumpkin spice (love it or hate it) is coming back to invade all sorts of grocery shelves. In other words, fall is here. You know what else is here besides numerous other mainstream autumnal traditions and events? If you keep up with the LoL (League of Legends) Esports scene, it’s the 2025 World Championships.

This isn’t a guide to explain the tournament format. The majority of people, including production staff, are still confused about the tournament format and the decisions behind it. Plus, that wouldn’t be as fun as talking about the more entertaining aspects, such as strange things such as Worlds narratives and superstitions. 

Worlds Winners & Team Uniform Colors

LoL Esports is considered moderately old within the Esports scene. It was first established in 2011, but it didn’t receive a proper World Championship until 2012. Even then, the budget for the venues and events didn’t exactly ramp up until 2013. However, there was a strange trend that occurred from 2014 to 2024 that no one exactly fully acknowledged until 2023; the World Championship winning teams’ uniforms all alternated between black and white. 

At first, this trend wasn’t exactly popular. The popular (and more sensible) thought was to look at previous match VODs (Videos On Demand) to predict how a team would do. This was the case from 2013 – 2021, but things began to diverge after 2021. In 2022, a Korean team called DRX achieved a miracle run and won Worlds despite having a close to zero chance of winning. They weren’t remotely close to being considered as contenders. DRX had worn white jackets and jerseys while wearing black pants. Meanwhile, the stronger favorite teams that they eliminated didn’t wear white. It was something closer to a niche concept in 2022. Then all hell broke loose after 2023. 

The LoL Esports Worlds 2023 Finalists. Picture taken by Colin Young-Wolff.

T1, the team that had lost to DRX in the finals, won while wearing all black uniforms. None of their opponents, including the favorites, were wearing black. Their fellow semi-final opponents, JDG, the overwhelming favorites to win Worlds that year, were wearing red and navy. The other finalist team, Weibo Gaming, was wearing white and red. Coincidentally, T1 had also worn all black during the Worlds 2022 Finals when they lost 3-2. Suddenly, everyone was aware of the trend from upper executives to fans. The fact that it even happened for over ten years in a row was absurd. Armageddon rained upon uniform design requests, and almost every team ended up having white uniforms for Worlds 2024. CEOs of Esports team organizations even openly admitted on Twitter (currently X) that they all were leaning into that superstition.

The LoL Esports Worlds 2024 Semifinalists. Photo found on Reddit.

This was a photo of all the 2024 semifinalists. Every team decided to follow the uniform color superstition. If every team wears white in the year where a team wearing white wins Worlds, surely there won’t be anything notable left… right? 

Nope. This gave birth to a new superstition to worry about after Worlds 2024. Someone found another trend with the Worlds winners. Yes, black and white are two incredibly common colors in clothing. Many people will probably wear at least one black or white colored clothing item per day without even noticing it. However, there was something many organizations forgot to take into account: 

The teams wearing white jerseys that won were wearing black pants and white jackets. 

There was only one semifinalist in Worlds 2024 wearing white jackets and black pants. It was T1 again. And no, they weren’t favorites to win Worlds 2024 despite qualifying for the finals back-to-back from 2022 to 2023.

Coming into 2025, it seems that even the nonbelievers have been converted. Based on announcements, every Asian team has decided to go for almost all black uniforms. Even Western teams, who didn’t care about the superstition remotely as much in 2024, are taking a stab at it this year. At this rate, Worlds 2025 will probably look like a large funeral.

Fans are also rating the likelihood of a specific team winning based on uniforms once again. But given that every team is wearing black now, it seems that relying on other superstitions would be more fitting. Apart from uniforms, Worlds winners have been predicted based on new yearly released anthems. The anthem for Worlds 2025, Sacrifice, has been brought up many times.

But who knows what will happen? The winner of Worlds 2022 had a reported 1.5% chance of victory, but they were also the only team that wore white. If something that miraculous could happen, surely there are remaining specific rules to the uniform superstition that will catch us all off guard.