Just want to make sure there's a shout out to the guy who wrote the first article on THE SYSTEM (I think): Anthony Brancato, here.

And am I the only one that's utterly and completely sick of "such and such QB is unbeaten in weather under X degrees"? C'mon, it's silly data mining.

And for the silliest, of course, Brett Favre is unbeaten (35-0 or so) when playing at home in weather under 34 degrees when not facing an African-American quarterback with the number 7.

I used to have a similarly stupid stat for Tom Brady involving the month of October except for the week of Halloween or something like that, but I can't remember it right now.

aarron you are a jerk. why are you biased against proffessionnal football teams and their fans? i hate you.

what was the temp when culpepper beat favre last year in the playoffs?

#3:

26 degrees, the 5th coldest game since 2000. The others:

12/8/2002 Minnesota Green Bay 11
12/11/2005 Detroit Green Bay 14
11/23/2005 Atlanta Philadelphia 17
1/16/2005 Indianapolis New England 25

Of course, it's hard to disagree with the numbers, but what of the suggested cause, that the cold itself somehow deters the dome teams?

I'd suggest that just as strong a factor is that dome teams create teams (through personnel decisions) that thrive with great footing on a fast track. In other words, quick teams versus beef teams. So, while it's surely cold outside in December up here in NE (22 degrees right now), it's also very true that any outdoor footing will be slick or mushy at best, and that teams build for quickness will lose to teams made for tug-o-wars.

Just to build on #5's idea, are any statistics avaliable on dome teams playing in the rain?

The bit about "no dome team has ever won the Super Bowl without playing all of its playoff games in a dome" makes me wonder: Is this another way of saying that teams with home field advantage throughout the playoffs have a better chance of winning the Super Bowl? If so, is that news? There isn't room for these kinds of issues in the NYT, but I'm curious how much of this is just home field advantage of the traditional kind.

That said, I can totally buy the argument that dome teams have a hard time playing outside in cold weather. Why not? This observation proves nothing, but I look back to how cold I felt at the beginning of this ridiculously cold December compared to how cold I feel now ("Wow, it's warm outside, almost 25 degrees!"), and it's hard to believe that acclimatization wouldn't make a difference in high-stakes outside games in the cold.

If anybody has the insight, I'd love to know how this relates specifically to the Cowboys and Dolphins. The reason I bring this up is that they are two "southern" teams who have often been very good over their histories. Some other southern teams, eg Saints, Bucs and Falcons, have for extended periods of time in their histories been complete doormats.

Re #4:

Gatts, can you elaborate? Surely there have been more games since 2000 played in colder weather? One that comes to mind is the NE-Tenn playoff games in Foxborough 2 seasons ago. That was in single digits.

Doug (#9 )--

Kickoff temperature for the Tennessee-New England divisional playoff game was 4 degrees (NFL gamebook linked).

Probably doesn't help that DET and MIN were dome teams who were horrible on the road everywhere over that timespan, not just in the cold.

Table?

Aaron,

Your timing is impeccable; I was just asking my buddy about whether any team has played a home Super Bowl. The answer, of course, was no. Miami, Phoenix/AZ, San Diego, Tampa, Jacksonville, Houston...now, with some of those teams, there are obvious institutional Super Bowl-barring issues (The Bidwill Effect, etc), but it is neat to see you all tackle this question.

Too bad the Lions blew the season away...though the sea of Orange in Ford Field must have been quite the spectacle..."Fi-re Mil-len!"

Yeah Aaron, not to plug something totally different but just to let all the readers know, the NYT story ahead a few pages: The Marist Red Foxes (my boys') stunning the St John's Red Storm 56-53 for their first Big East win ever! but yeah good article..

I wonder, on an Outsiders topic, since you guys say that teams should win 50% of their close games (unless they're the Pats), do you think that applies in Basketball too?

re #9

I was referring only to the subset discussed in the article

But wait, you say, THE SYSTEM hasn’t worked very well this year

even after going 3-0 this weekend, THE SYSTEM is 9-14-2 this year

Is it possible that during the time period presented the cold weather teams were simply better as a group? In other words, during the last few years beating NE, Pitt, Denver, KC and Philly/GB (at least until this year) at home in any temp was difficult. Are these dome teams losing at a greater rate to these teams when it's cold?

Interesting article. Obviously this is a really small sample. How many times have dome teams made the playoffs?

I was in Lambeau field on Dec. 11 of this year. While kickoff temperature may have been listed as 14 degrees, I don't think that takes into consideration the wind chill factor, which I think made the temperature 4 below. Ungodly cold.

I was just asking my buddy about whether any team has played a home Super Bowl.

Two teams were close. The Los Angeles Rams played Super Bowl XIV in the Rose Bowl.

The San Francisco 49ers played Super Bowl XIX in Palo Alto.