The history of Kai’Sa in professional League of Legends play

Since Kai’Sa’s introduction to the rift in season eight, the champion has been a stable pick across all regions. Thanks to the champion’s diversity in playstyle, and outrageous damage output, most teams will have their bot laner be at least proficient with it.

In season 11, Kai’Sa has found her place in the meta. The current worldwide professional strategy revolves around either diving the enemy team or kiting back an enemy’s engagement. Teams that favor the dive composition keep Kai’Sa in their back pocket and pick the champion consistently. Over the course of the season, Kai’Sa has been the most-picked champion across all regions.

Kai’Sa statistics through the years of LoL pro play

The champion did not start out at the 90% presence rate it has today, but she was still widely popular on release. In season eight, Kai’Sa was picked in over 800 matches and saw play in both the jungle and mid lane, while the majority of her play time was in the bottom lane.

Season nine was when the champion’s play rate really exploded, breaking into over 1,600 games played and pulling almost 500 bans. This was when the champion was especially strong with the Rageblade and Manamune build, and pro players abused that strength to its fullest extent.

Moving into the more modern era of the professional scene, Kai’Sa saw a massive drop off in play in season 10 as more utility and ability-powered champions became prominent in the role.  

Kai’Sa is popular worldwide, but she is definitely favored by some regions more than others. The region that the champion is picked most often is China. In the LPL, Kai’Sa has been played in almost 700 matches, dwarfing the pick rate in the LCK and almost doubling her matches in the LCS.

Of the big regional leagues, the LPL does not have the best win rate with the champion. In part because of the amount of games, Kai’Sa’s win percentage has taken a hit. North America actually has the highest win rate with the champion, posting a 54.6% win ratio, just behind China’s 53.9%

The LCK and LEC are a tad but behind in terms of the win rate statistic for Kai’Sa, putting up 47.5% and 48.2% respectively.

Who are the best Kai’Sa players?

Because of the champion’s high rate of play in the LPL, most of the best Kai’Sa players are from the Chinese region. Of those with the best KDA, EDward Gaming’s Park “Viper” Do-hyeon is at the top the table with a 6.1 KDA in 50 games played. Not far behind him is the recently retired Jian “Uzi” Zi-Hao, who has a 6.0 KDA over the course of 41 games.

As for win rates, former world champion Yu “JackeyLove” Wen-Bo takes the cake with an almost 70% win rate on Kai’Sa with over 60 games. Below him are Hu “iBoy” Xian-Zhao and Lin “Lwx” Wei-Xiang with over 60% win rates with more than 60 games played.