There's nothing wrong with weather being a factor in football games. Us old-time fans appreciate it; part of the game. But those of us in fantasy competitions can also make lineup choices based on it, which looks prudent on Sunday.
Rams at Bears will be kicking off on Sunday night at 5:30 p.m. local time. Weather.com indicates temperatures will be dropping into the single digits, and winds could be up to 20-22 miles per hour. Seems like the kind of thing that could affect both passing games, slowing down what Matthew Stafford and Sean McVay would like to be doing, Caleb Williams and Ben Johnson too.
In contrast, Bills-Broncos will be played in sunny conditions in Denver on Saturday afternoon -- looks like about 40 degrees, 8 mph winds. San Francisco at Seattle tomorrow night, 43 degrees, no rain or wind expected. Houston at New England on Sunday afternoon may have some snow, up to a 60 percent chance, temperatures around 30 degrees, not much wind. (Given the presence of Houston's defense in the game, that one seemed lower-scoring anyway.)
Rams-Bears is the one I'm concerned about weather-wise; I feel like Kyren-Corum and Swift-Monangai will have to be carrying more of the offensive load than the passing games. It's enough, I think, to shy away from the quarterbacks and pass catchers; guys like Puka Nacua and Colston Loveland aren't players you sit down for just anyone, but maybe Jaxon Smith-Njigba gets the edge at wideout, and possible a tight end playing in a better weather game (one of the Daltons perhaps) gets the edge.
I don't have a formal database of games played in certain conditions; just going by memory of lots of Packers, Giants or Patriots playoff games in cold weather. Best I could do was use the search tools at pro-football-reference.com to pull the game totals from all Soldier Field games in January since 2000 (regular season or playoffs), which gave me a total of 15 games (including last week's against the Packers).
That one was a lot warmer (32 degrees) and with a lot less wind (6 mph) than what we'll be getting on Sunday evening. Accordingly, 58 total points were scored.
Anyway, here are the 15 games played in January at Soldier Field since 2000. Over 50 total points in nearly half of those games (7).
| JANUARY GAMES AT SOLDIER FIELD, 2000- | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Date | Week | Opp | Result | PF | PA | Total |
| 1/6/2002 | 17 | JAX | W, 33-13 | 33 | 13 | 46 |
| 1/19/2002 | 19 | PHI | L, 19-33 | 19 | 33 | 52 |
| 1/2/2005 | 17 | GNB | L, 14-31 | 14 | 31 | 45 |
| 1/15/2006 | 19 | CAR | L, 21-29 | 21 | 29 | 50 |
| 1/14/2007 | 19 | SEA | W, 27-24 (OT) | 27 | 24 | 51 |
| 1/21/2007 | 20 | NOR | W, 39-14 | 39 | 14 | 53 |
| 1/16/2011 | 19 | SEA | W, 35-24 | 35 | 24 | 59 |
| 1/23/2011 | 20 | GNB | L, 14-21 | 14 | 21 | 35 |
| 1/3/2016 | 17 | DET | L, 20-24 | 20 | 24 | 44 |
| 1/6/2019 | 18 | PHI | L, 15-16 | 15 | 16 | 31 |
| 1/3/2021 | 17 | GNB | L, 16-35 | 16 | 35 | 51 |
| 1/2/2022 | 17 | NYG | W, 29-3 | 29 | 3 | 32 |
| 1/8/2023 | 18 | MIN | L, 13-29 | 13 | 29 | 42 |
| 1/4/2026 | 18 | DET | L, 16-19 | 16 | 19 | 35 |
| 1/10/2026 | 19 | GNB | W, 31-27 | 31 | 27 | 58 |
Bottom line: maybe the wind won't be as bad as today's forecast suggests, and with Nacua being a big, strong dude, perhaps he'll be just fine. Past January games in Chicago seem like they've been OK, plus the Bears were just 24th in scoring defense during the season, allowing an average of nearly 25 points per week.
But in general, if I'm picking from the four games, I'm going to be favoring passing games from other teams (not ones facing the Texans perhaps). Just seems like conditions best avoiding with any marginal receiving options.
--Andy Richardson