All eyes are on the desert southwest as Super Bowl LVII will wrap up this year’s NFL season in style. The Kansas City Chiefs will face the Philadelphia Eagles on Sunday at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Ariz.
And while the biggest question is who will win this year’s big game, there’s another one some are asking – will the weather play a role in choosing this year’s winner?
Weather out west earlier this week has been pretty decent leading up to the game. While a new storm system barreled out of the Pacific Northwest midweek, an area of high pressure over the Rockies descended south, protecting Arizona from seeing any sizeable weather changes.
Fans in attendance at Super Bowl LVII can expect a great forecast with temperatures likely remaining in the lower 70s to start the game, falling into the 60s by the end of the game.
Mostly sunny skies will be accompanied by a west wind throughout the evening, around 10 to 15 mph.
How does the weather compare to previous Super Bowls?
Arizona has hosted the NFL’s biggest game three times prior to this Sunday’s event. Glendale hosted two Super Bowls in 2008 and 2015. The third was in 1996 in Tempe, when Arizona State’s Sun Devil Stadium was the site of the big game.
It’s possible this could be one of the warmest Super Bowl’s on record for Arizona. The previous three Super Bowl kickoff temperatures were 66, 68 and 70 degrees.
Two of the previous three Super Bowls hosted in the state saw clear skies while only one, back in 2008, saw a few light rain showers through the area.
Neither the Chiefs nor Eagles have played in the big game out in Arizona before, but both teams are used to the weather expected for the game.
Who has the “weather advantage?”
State Farm Stadium is unique in that the arena has a retractable roof. This allows those playing inside the option to keep the outdoor elements from coming in during the game.
And while the NFL opts to keep the roof closed during the early start of the NFL season, the roof will probably be open according to a statement from an NFL official earlier this week.
So how does that impact the matchup? Thanks to NFL statistics, we can finally predict not only the weather forecast, but a game winner as well.
Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes and Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts are no strangers to playing in the cold, but warm weather is a bit of an outlier.
In games deemed warm – where the kickoff temperature ranges between 61 and 80 degrees – the two have combined for only 32.8% of games played in this type of weather environment.
For Mahomes, he’s played in 23 games deemed warm and has an averaged quarterback rating of 107.1. Compare that to Hurts, who has only played in only 18 warm weather games and has an average QBR of 100.1.
Quarterback Rating is a metric that takes into account all a quarterback’s contribution throughout the course of a game. The higher the number, the better the game he had. (Advantage: Chiefs)
Completions are a major component to winning an NFL game, and in warm weather environments both quarterbacks thrive. Mahomes has a completion rating of 66.2% in warm weather games, whereas Hurts has a slightly worse completion rating of 63.9%. (Slight Advantage: Chiefs)
Those completions can mean nothing if they don’t convert to a touchdown. For Mahomes, he has thrown for 63 touchdowns in warm weather games. That compared to Hurts 20 touchdowns.
When you average the touchdown rate out over a similar sample size of games, though, Mahomes throws for a touchdown in 78.7% of all his warm weather games. Hurts only throws a touchdown 44.4% of the time in warm weather games. (Advantage: Chiefs)
So while the weather surely favors the Chiefs in the big game Sunday night, we know there are plenty of other factors too, like the crowd, the stadium atmosphere, coaching and the other 52 players on the roster.
Whoever you cheer for, Chiefs or Eagles, one thing is for certain – mother nature will be putting on her own show in the sky with sunshine and warmth.
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