The Role of Religious Rituals and Superstition in Pro Sports

by Dan Holmes, October 16, 2025

In the realm of professional sports, logic often yields to ritual. These athlete superstitions are not mere quirks, but deeply ingrained routines believed to influence outcomes. They provide a psychological anchor in games governed by chance and skill, offering a fragile sense of control over the uncontrollable. From locker rooms to the field of play, these practices are a fascinating, and sometimes bizarre, part of the athletic landscape across major leagues.

Most Famous Athlete Superstitions

On a team level, shared religious practices and superstitions forge a unique cohesion built on mutual vulnerability and values, not just strategic goals. This communal identity can be a powerful unifying force. In the world of professional sports, where careers are short and fortunes uncertain, superstition and faith offers a framework for finding purpose beyond the immediate outcome of a single contest.

• Famous Athlete Superstitions in the NFL, NBA, and NHL
• Religious Rituals in Pro Sports
• Baseball: Most Superstitious Sport

Famous Superstitions in the NFL, NBA, and NHL

In the NFL, routines are sacrosanct. Chiefs’ Quarterback Patrick Mahomes has worn the same pair of red underwear for every game since his professional career began. Former linebacker Brian Urlacher famously had to eat exactly two chocolate chip cookies before every contest. These are not casual habits but essential components of their mental preparation, linking a specific action in a most superstitious sport.

The NBA has a pantheon of superstitious legends. Michael Jordan wore his University of North Carolina practice shorts under his Chicago Bulls uniform for his entire career, a talisman from his collegiate championship. LeBron James’s pre-game chalk toss became an iconic spectacle akin to, top NBA sportsbooks. These acts become part of a player’s personal brand.

Religious Rituals in Pro Sports

The intersection of faith and sport provides athletes with a psychological ballast against the immense pressures of competition. These practices are not superstitious gestures but structured rituals that anchor an athlete’s identity in something more permanent than a win loss record.

Religious observance also recalibrates the metrics of success. The objective can shift from personal glory to honoring a higher power through effort and conduct. This recontextualization provides resilience; a loss is not an indictment of personal worth but an event within a spiritual narrative. A quiet prayer in the locker room or a moment of reflection on the field becomes an act of submitting the outcome to a transcendent purpose.

We have seen the athletic arena become a platform for public testimony, transforming a personal act of devotion into a shared expression of faith. In this context, athletics is framed as an act of worship, connecting the individual’s talent to a divine source.

Baseball Superstitions

Baseball has fostered the most athlete superstitions over the years. From not mentioning a no-hitter is in progress, to wearing the same T-shirt when your team is winning. Baseball players and fans adhere to an unwritten code of superstition.

Baseball Hall of Fame third baseman Wade Boggs ate the same meal and fielded 150 ground balls before each game, started batting practice at the same time (5:17 PM before night games) and ran wind sprints at the exact same time (7:17 PM). When he stepped into the batter’s box, Boggs would draw the Hebrew symbol for life in the dirt.

Baseball is clearly the most superstitious sport: many players have been superstitious. Famed Yankee Joe DiMaggio always stepped on second base when he ran in from his position in the outfield (Babe Ruth did the same thing). When he was a player, Casey Stengel frequently put a lady’s hair ribbon under his cap for good luck.

Lots of players have carried a lucky rabbit’s foot, Goose Goslin and Jimmie Foxx for example. Rogers Hornsby liked to sit in the same spot in the dugout after he collected a hit and he wouldn’t move until he had a hitless at-bat. Nellie Fox once had a good game with a $10 bill in his pocket, so he began keeping money in his uniform every game.

Hall of Fame ace pitcher Jim Palmer liked to eat pancakes before every start and insisted on catching the game ball from the same coach before he went to the mound as a superstition in sports. Pitcher Turk Wendell used to wave at his center fielder, and he wouldn’t throw the first pitch of the game until the center fielder waved back.

Former MVP Justin Morneau took the field at the same time and took batting practice at the same time. After having a good game when he unknowingly wore one of his teammates’ socks, Mark Teixeira wore two different socks in every game after that.

Justin Verlander ate Taco Bell the night before starts, while Matt Garza scarfed down Popeye’s Chicken. Mark Fidrych groomed the mound by hand and insisted that a baseball be taken out of a game after it surrendered a hit.

Former Red Sox shortstop Nomar Garciaparra had an obsessive routine with his cleats and batting gloves every turn at bat that became a famous athlete superstition. He was so afraid of jinxing his performance on the field that kids even copied his obsessive rituals.

Roger Clemens touched the plaque of Babe Ruth with his pitching hand before his games at Yankee Stadium. Willie Stargell would not use a bat that had his name on it, even after Louisville Slugger made his model, Pops liked to borrow a bat from a teammate.

Numbers have often been a source of superstition in sports. Larry Walker was fixated on the number three: he wore #33; he set his alarm for 33 minutes after the hour; he always took three practice swings; and he was even married on the 3rd of the month at precisely 3:33 PM.

Here’s more time-sensitive superstition: Lefty Grove did not like to throw the first pitch of the game until the clock was on an even minute, say 1:12 PM. Most players will do anything to keep the same uniform number, some going as far to pay tens of thousands of dollars to another player to get the number they want.

When was the last time you thought about hairpins? It’s probably been a while. But there was a time when the hairpin was an obsessive trinket to a baseball player. Most batters believed a stray hairpin was equal to a base hit. Must be ladies wore a lot of them, because some batters, like Rogers Hornsby and Joe Medwick were obsessed with finding them.

Once, when Cardinals leadoff man Pepper Martin was in a terrible slump, a sportswriter placed hairpins in his path to help him get out of the funk. But Medwick saw them first and scooped them up. When the sportswriter explained, Joe said, “Let him find his own base hits”.

Famed Giants manager John McGraw noted that his team had a great day at the plate after a beer wagon passed by the ballpark. The sight of the wagon seemed to spur on his boys. Superstitious to a fault, McGraw made arrangements to have a similar wagon travel past the Polo grounds every day until his team lost again.