Don't misinterpret stats from champion.gg

Every now and then I see a post saying "champion.gg shows that champs who max w before e have a lower winrate so why do I keep seeing idiots maxing w before e"?

Well, the right skill ordering often depends upon the matchup, and some matchups are better than others. As a consequence, some skill orderings will have a lower winrate even when it is correct to level that skill first in the given circumstances.

How about an example.

As Nasus I always max q first. However, I sometimes max w next or e next. e shreds a lot of armor and is great for an all-in duel (at which Nasus excels mid to late game). It's also good for pushing lane if I won my lane and need the option to quickly put pressure on turrets. w is great at either helping me to escape, preventing an enemy from escaping, or reducing an enemy's attack speed to help me win a duel/teamfight.

Well, vayne and quin are hard counters to nasus because of their insane early-game bullying. Without a lot of jungler help, I have a bad time. They are auto-attack centric, and they won't stand in my spirit fire to duel me. So I max w (wither) second versus them. But because they counter me, I have a worse winrate laning against them. Also if a lane is going really badly and I need to be able to reliably escape from some other champion, i max w second. Consistent with this, on champion.gg Nasus has a higher winrate when he maxes spirit fire after q (rather than wither after q). That does NOT mean he should always max spirit fire second. It means that Nasus has a lower winrate when bad matchups force him to max wither second.

The long and short of it is that correlation does not imply causation. There is reverse causation here (or 'endogeneity'). Not only does the skill ordering cause the outcome of the matchup, but the matchup causes the skill ordering.