Is the LTA a failure already? LCS died for this?

There’s been a lot of community conjecture around whether the LTA’s inaugural split, and launch as a product, can be considered a failure out of the gate. So, can it? 

North American League of Legends has gone for a wild ride in the past five years. It has seen huge team slot transfers, the implosion of its most iconic organization, and the largest financial scandal of modern times. It’s not been an easy ride for North America or its fans when it comes to the highest level of LoL esports. The convergence of the League of The Americas (LTA) when announced in 2024. It was meant to revolutionize Americas LoL. Stacking the LCS and thriving CBLOL, LLA, and LAT AM in Riot’s homefield broadcast seemed like a huge potential win.

And yet, come end of split one, many are left looking around at what’s left after the merger and asking “is the LTA just a failure?” 

If the LTA is a failure, what changed?

One aspect of the LTA North’s changes was the change in team slots, Disguised joins the league, LYON migrates up from the Central American/South American pool, and 100 Thieves moves to a Provisional Guest spot, whatever that means. It’s a serious reshuffle that warps the face of NA LoL Esports, and that can feel alien for fans. 

• There’s LYON, meant to pull Latin American viewership into the league, integrating the fan bases – and yet, I haven’t felt that at any point. LYON’s clear operational restrictions, compared to their opponents, means that instead of a hype competitor to rival the best, we’ve got another team battling it out for bottom half.
• Disguised, while adored for DisguisedToast’s popularity and transparency, is pretty clearly at a similar operational deficit. And there’s a Sword of Damocles hanging over the heads of one of the region’s four most-recognizable teams, and one that they opted to put there.

Where we’re at: Viewership is short of where it should be, fans are going weeks and weeks without seeing teams play, and negativity is at an all-time-high. LTA North fans just had to watch their teams fly out to Sao Paolo to rinse the LTA Sul teams while playing out of practice rooms with no windows, while LTA Sul fans get to watch four more-advantaged, better-funded teams blow through their four best competitors before enacting their semifinals and finals in the LTAS studio. The inter-conference event felt like watching four NA orgs slap the competition around with their operation budgets, and that’s a bad experience for everyone involved. 

Shopify Rebellion-style Mogul Moves are LTA’s biggest win

Here’s where I get to be optimistic, in the face of all the cards stacked against LTA – one thing being lost on many doomsayers, to me, is the addition of two enormously influential figures in the live-streaming space to the League’s representatives. I’ll be entirely honest, Shopify Rebellion has been struggling to find an evocative, easily remembered brand in the LTA. For the most part, it’s been the org built on the ashes of the ascendant CLG, and has generally fallen short of its potential. This isn’t Shopify’s fault, but filling the shoes of CLG is an incredibly tough ask, and SR just hasn’t had that iconic, defining identity that fans can easily associate with it. 

The addition of Ludwig and Moistcritikal as part-owners, and crucially, promoters, is an absolute godsend for the League. I look to the LoL Esports fans around me, and hearing somebody say “I’m probably gonna skip the Shopify game and get a bite to eat”, was a common occurrence before this year. Now, there’s an appeal for non-esports-oriented fans to tune in, watching Ludwig stress over his team’s games. Ludwig’s League of Legends grind was the biggest story of the LoL Esports off-season, so tying 2025’s biggest non LoL-Esports community story into the pro league is a fantastic win for the sport.

Disguised is promising for similar reasons, though Toast on his own does lack the combined star power of both MoistCritikal and Ludwig. We even might get MrBeast to buy an LTA North slot soon, to really drive the content creator turned esports org owner narrative forward.

No, LTA isn’t dead on arrival, but it’s not thriving

So here’s where I’m at:

“No, the LTA product is not a complete failure on launch. The integration of influencer-adjacent organizations, the addition of Fearless Draft, integration between the in-game Seasons, their events, and the LoL Esports season, there are huge positives here. However, there are growing pains that are acute and obvious in the LTA right now. The Split 1 format isn’t working, it’s too few games, and breaking up the schedule so early to arrange a mini-international that doesn’t feel competitive.”

The shock #1 seed who almost pulled a full Cinderella run? They might be completely out of the league come end-of-year, a decision that will hinge Riot Games, a company known for saying it is short on monetization in 2025, not selling a multi-million dollar franchising slot to the highest bidder. At the same time, the influencer-adjacent org of Disguised, certainly the most exciting of the new arrivals, have to play for their future with the chance of being relegated from LTA North come year end.

LTA isn’t a failure, nor is it a smash success. It’s off to a struggling start, one that can help build momentum with improvements, or halt the growth of the league severely. I understand why people are worried, I understand why Split 1 leaves many LoL Esports fans wanting more, but I’m not yet ready to say the LTA project is a wholesale failure.

So no, the LTA isn’t a failure, it’s experiencing many of the understandable growing pains one might expect, but it also has some self-inflicted obstacles. No, it’s not perfect – and if next year’s Split 1 feels the same, I’ll be much more negative. But I’m not ready to cast aside something this brand-new, not when we have yet to see its potential play out over the course of a year.