When it comes to sports, fans have a love for superstitions. Whether it is wearing a lucky shirt, sitting in a particular spot on the couch or eating a certain food in particular, many sports fans are extremely superstitious beings. However, would you believe that some athletes and teams even hold superstitions that they believe help them perform their best on game days? Well it’s true and here are five examples of it.
1. Michael Jordan
(source: http://www.lesaviezvous.net/)
Yes, even the greatest basketball player to ever walk the the earth has his own specific superstition that he made sure to do each and every game. Jordan, who played his college ball at the University of North Carolina, made it a ritual to wear his UNC shorts under his uniform for each and every game in the NBA. In order to conceal the shorts, he began to wear shorts that were slightly longer, which inspired the shorts of the modern day NBA.
2. Jason Terry
(source: thecomeback.com)
Jason Terry is an NBA guard who is one of the best three point shooters of all time and is a former NBA champion. He has a number of smaller superstitions such as eating chicken before games and wearing 5 pairs of socks, but he has one superstition that sticks out above the rest. biggest superstition is that every night before a game, he goes to sleep wearing the shorts of the opponents that his team is playing the next night. How he gets these shorts is not clear, but the veteran must have quite the collection.
3. Patrick Roy
(source: gamewornauctions.net)
Patrick Roy is not only arguably the best goaltender in NHL history, a talented and award winning coach and the one who popularized the “butterfly” style of goaltending, he is also the owner of perhaps the weirdest superstition in NHL history. Roy would talk to and have conversations with his goalposts. Roy felt that by talking to his posts, they would be on his side during the game and it would help to improve his game. As crazy as it sounds, his superstition helped pave the way for his fantastic career, so who are we to judge him.
4. Lyoto Machida
(source: lyotonmachida.net)
This superstition is without a doubt the grossest that appears in this article. This superstition or practice is apparently very healthy for you and cleanses the body, but few take it up. That is because, every single morning, Lyoto Machida drinks his own urine. He picked up the habit from his father, who is a Karate master. Personally, I don’t care how good it is for me, I’m not drinking my own pee.
5. 2006 Ecuador World Cup Soccer Team
(source: soccerstat.com)
This was a weird one that actually seemed to have worked out for the better. The 2006 World Cup Team from Ecuador used a very uncommon and unconventional tactic to try and gain the upper hand in the tournament. The team brought in a shaman to visit all of the World Cup venues in Germany in order to banish evil spirits from the tournament. The crazy thing about this superstition that it may have actually paid off as the 2006 Ecuadorian team had their best finish in World Cup history as they made it to the Round of 16.
