One of the main reasons why I enjoy professional League of Legends so much is because it’s simply something that Koreans are absolutely, irrefutably the greatest in the world at. I’ve watched and had my heart crushed enough times at watching Koreans excel but fall short in a variety of international contests such as baseball, soccer and various Olympic sports to know how much I actually want to see South Korea win things, and in professional League, I not only have such, but because I also play the game recreationally, I have the ability to relate and understand how the players are playing and to appreciate just how good they really are.
Needless to say, over the last four years or so of watching professional League, I’ve witnessed Koreans dominate the scene without any legitimate concern that the ride is going to end any time soon; and personally, I love it to no end.
Obviously, a discussion about professional League of Legends dominance cannot be had without mentioning SK Telecom T1, the be-all, end-all when it comes to the entire esport. Three-time World champions in an arena that’s only six years old, winners of countless tournaments both domestic and international, and after yesterday, two-time winners of the Riot Games Mid-Season Invitational, AKA mini-Worlds. The bottom line is that SKT wins big and wins often, and their dominance over the scene is pretty overwhelming.
In other sports, this kind of suffocating excellence often prompts discussion over whether their constant winning is a detriment for the sport as a whole, and the League scene is really no exception. SKT has been on top of the League scene for nearly four full years now, with only hiccups in Season 4 and the first Mid-Season Invitational, where they failed to win, but won just about everything else otherwise. Suffice to say, it’s not really that big of a surprise that there are large swaths of League fans out there that have simply gotten bored of SKT’s constant winning, and have turned their allegiances against them.
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