The Miami Dolphins will leave the warm confines of Florida and land in a frozen wind tunnel near the Kansas-Missouri line ahead of their Wild Card battle with the Kansas City Chiefs. We’re still five days from the game, so the forecast isn’t going to be 100% accurate, but it is going to be darn cold for this Chiefs-Dolphins matchup. And that possible bad weather has bettors hammering the under after the opening odds came out on Sunday night.
Opening odds at DraftKings Sportsbook had the over set at 47.5 total points, but overnight that number fell five points to 42.5 points. As usual, we have to be careful not to overreact to weather reports, but high winds and extreme cold are going to impact games if they are windy and cold enough.
Weather for Chiefs vs. Dolphins in Wild Card round
Forecast
The game is at 8 p.m. ET on Saturday night, so we won’t get any warming from the sun, but sometimes wind speeds fall with the sun.
January 11th update: Here is the NOAA’s updated forecast for Saturday and Saturday night in the Kansas City area:
Saturday: A slight chance of snow after noon. Mostly cloudy and cold, with a high near 8. Northwest wind 14 to 17 mph, with gusts as high as 28 mph. Chance of precipitation is 20%.
Saturday night: Mostly cloudy, with a low around -8. Blustery.
The wind speeds are moving in the wrong direction as we get closer to the game. We could see feels-like temperatures down to -30 degrees with winds into the 20s.
January 10th update — Here is NOAA’s updated forecast for Saturday and Saturday night in the Kansa City area:
Saturday: Partly sunny and cold, with a high near 11.
Saturday night: A chance of snow after midnight. Mostly cloudy, with a low around -5. Chance of precipitation is 30%.
We’re still waiting on wind predictions from NOAA, but other outlets are calling for 10-15 mph. If that holds, the wind chill will be ugly, but the impact on the ball in the air won’t be too bad. Still, the temperatures will be troublesome.
January 8th — Here is NOAA’s forecast for Saturday and Saturday night in the Kansa City area:
Saturday: Mostly cloudy and cold, with a high near 14. Blustery.
Saturday night: Mostly cloudy, with a low around -2.
Much will depend on the wind speed at game time, but there’s no doubt that it is going to be extremely cold and any wind at all is going to be biting. The hope is that winds calm a bit Saturday night, but we’re just too early to be able to make any kind of call on wind speeds just yet.
