With Super Bowl LI being played inside a stadium with a retractable roof, weather could actually become a factor when the Patriots and Falcons kick off on Feb. 5.
Obviously, if the roof at NRG Stadium is closed, then weather won’t be a factor, but the NFL is hoping that the roof will be open when the game kicks off at 5:30 p.m. CT/6:30 p.m. ET in Houston.
Eric Finkelstein, the NFL’s director of events, said this week that the league won’t make a final call on whether the roof will be open until Saturday, Feb. 4.
“If the weather cooperates with us — which we hope it does — the roof will be open,” Finkelstein told the Associated Press.
The problem for the NFL is that right now, it doesn’t look like the weather is going to cooperate.
Current Super Bowl LI forecast
The current forecast in Houston is calling for rain on Super Bowl Sunday. The good news for the NFL is that the rain is supposed to taper off throughout the day.
Accuweather.com says that there’s a 30 percent chance for rain in Houston on game day. However, even with the forecast, the league still might consider opening the roof because the chance of rain is expected to go down to zero percent as the afternoon turns into the evening.
Accuweather says there is a 30 percent chance of rain in the afternoon of Feb. 5. Accuweather
On the other hand, the forecast from Weather.com isn’t as optimistic. Their long-term forecast says that there’s a 60 percent chance of rain on Super Bowl Sunday, which will dip down to 20 percent later in the evening.
If the Weather.com model ends up being the most accurate, the NFL would likely close the roof. However, if the Accuweather forecast ends up being right, there’s a good chance the league would keep the roof open.
Keep in mind, the Super Bowl is still 10 days away, so the forecast could change at anytime. We’ll he updating the weather forecast daily so that you have the most accurate information.
Tom Brady or Matt Ryan: Who benefits more from the roof decision?
When it comes to playing indoors or outdoors, there might not be two more contrasting quarterbacks in the league than Tom Brady and Matt Ryan. Ryan played nine indoor games in 2017 while Brady played in zero. That’s right, Brady didn’t play a single game inside of a dome all season.
Coincidentally enough, the last time Brady played indoors came in Houston when the Patriots beat the Texans 27-6 in December 2015. In that game, Brady finished 22 of 30 for 226 yards with two touchdowns.
As for Ryan, the Falcons went 5-2 in outdoor games this year and 6-3 in indoor games.
The Falcons have been wildly more successful playing indoors throughout Ryan’s career with the Falcons going 58-30. In those 88 games, Ryan has averaged 266.6 yards passing (23,461 total). In those 88 games, Ryan has thrown 150 touchdown passes and 67 interceptions.
In outdoor games, Ryan has a career record of just 27-27. In those 54 games, he has averaged 263.7 yards, which is very similar to his indoor number. However, Ryan has thrown 90 touchdown passes and 47 interceptions, which means his TD-to-INT ratio of 1.91 touchdowns for every interception isn’t quite as impressive as his indoor TD-to-INT ratio of 2.24 to 1.
On Brady’s end, the Patriots quarterback has been dominant indoors, going 16-4. Brady has averaged 269.0 yards indoors while averaging just 259.0 in outdoor games. Brady has thrown 42 touchdown passes and 17 interceptions indoors for a TD-to-INT ratio of 2.47-to-1, which is nowhere near his astronomical outdoor ratio of 3.07-to-1.
Basically, both quarterbacks have been good whether they’re playing indoors or outdoors. However, the Falcons’ 27-27 record outdoors suggests that the team as a whole struggles when it moves outside.
One other note, both quarterbacks have played fewer than 10 games in a retractable-roof stadium like NRG. We lumped those in with the dome games, since the roof was closed when they played each game.
However, if we look at those individually, here’s what you get:
Tom Brady: 6-2 record, 188 of 280 for 2,370 yards, 67.1 completion percentage, 16 touchdowns, eight interceptions.
Matt Ryan: 2-3 record, 111 of 203 for 1,326 yards, 54.7 completion percentage, nine touchdowns, nine interceptions.
Well, it looks like Brady does have one advantage: He seems to be considerably better than Ryan when playing in a stadium with a retractable roof.
(Indoor/outdoor stats via ProFootballReference.com)
The post 2017 Super Bowl: Here’s the weather forecast in Houston for Patriots vs. Falcons appeared first on Extreeemesports.