In the final week of the LCK Summer 2023 group stage, good news arrived as Faker officially returned to the starting lineup of T1. Immediately, the T1 players shook off their lackluster image from the first round against DRX and secured two consecutive victories. One of those was a decisive win (against Kwangdong Freecs) that showcased T1’s true style when facing lower-tier teams before Faker’s injury.
Not only T1 but also the LCK benefited from Faker’s return. According to statistics from the specialized site Eschart, the viewership of the T1 – KDF match increased by 18% (around 475k viewers) compared to previous T1 matches (which only had around 400k viewers). This figure also surpassed the approximately 450k viewers during the T1 vs. DRX match in the first round – the match that marked Faker’s absence from the T1 lineup due to injury.
As previously mentioned, T1 and Faker have always been an important “viewership magnet” for the LCK. As the most famous team in the LCK, T1’s matches have a significant impact on the tournament’s box office revenue. The top 10 most-watched matches this season all include T1’s games. Even when expanding the scope to 20, only two or three matches did not feature Faker and his teammates. The increase in T1’s viewership is expected to be a positive sign for the tournament’s box office success, but it also brings along many issues.
One audience opinion bluntly stated: “LCK will fail when there is no Faker.” To emphasize, even T1’s matches in the LCK Summer 2023 did not always have consistently high viewership. For instance, the T1 – Gen.G match in the opening week had over 760k viewers. If we disregard subjective factors (T1 faced a weak team in a playoff-clinched context), the average viewership still dropped significantly. Looking at the whole tournament, the average viewership also decreased by about 30% (from around 230k down to just 160k).
Of course, the playoff matches may help the LCK solve this problem. But that likely depends heavily on the top-tier teams and especially how far T1 can progress in this tournament.