Despite Dome Excellence, Josh Allen Still Has The Ultimate Home Field Advantage
Credit: Lon Horwedel-Imagn Images
Josh Allen is an elite quarterback, no matter if he’s in a dome, in Sunny South Florida, or if he’s playing in the middle of a snowstorm. Still, after his success over the last couple of weeks inside two different domes, there has been increased chatter about how the next stadium in Buffalo should have included a roof.
After all, what Allen did inside SoFi Stadium and Ford Field was quite special. During those two games, the quarterback threw for 704 yards and scored ten total touchdowns. While his two-game dome run was incredible, don’t let that fool you. The best home-field advantage for Buffalo is still during the middle of a snowstorm.
It doesn’t matter the profession, it’s always easiest to do it in perfect conditions. Do you think Tiger Woods was excited when he looked at the weather report before the Sunday of the Masters and saw 30-mph winds? Of course not, but one of the reasons he is the best golfer of all time is his ability to control the ball’s flight with spin, which helps keep the ball out of the wind.
Allen knows a thing or two about golf, as he finished tied for sixth place at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am Golf Tournament. When on the gridiron, Allen takes that golfer mindset of being able to constantly adapt to the conditions.
Any quarterback is going to see their performance generally drop in poor weather, and Allen has had some clunkers in cold-weather games before. But he has also had some pretty special performances, including last year in the playoffs against the Pittsburgh Steelers. On a frigid 17-degree night, with snowballs flying from the fans, Allen completed 21 of his 30 passes for 203 yards and two touchdowns. He also rushed eight times for 74 yards and a touchdown, including an impressive 52-yarder run that found the end zone.
Josh Allen is doing Josh Allen things against the Steelers. What a run 🤯 pic.twitter.com/FpYRJbjJKs
— Def Pen Sports (@DefPenSports) January 15, 2024
Allen’s stats in the cold obviously don’t look as good as the dome, but no one’s does. Look at Tua Tagovailoa, the NFL’s current poster boy for a lack of cold-weather success. In games where the temperature was 45 degrees or less, Tagovailoa has won a grand total of *Drum Roll Please* zero times in eight attempts. Before Tua’s game against the Green Bay Packers in November, he didn’t mince words talking about the issue.
“I would say the biggest thing is mindset,” he explained. “We’re obviously nowhere near the temperatures that all these other cold teams play at being in Miami, where it’s 80. Sometimes it gets down to 50, but it just gets nowhere near the teams that make it in long stretches in the run that they try to do. To me, it’s just a mindset. That’s really all it is.”
Tagovailoa can talk about the mindset all he wants, but with eight straight games losing games below 45 degrees, it’s clear he doesn’t have the mindset to win in cold games. Imagine a future where Tua is getting ready for one of those December games in Buffalo, but knowing he’ll get to play in a dome. He wouldn’t need any different mindset to be there as he does in South Beach.
Then imagine what it’s going to be like in a few years. It’s the middle of December, lake effect snow just dumped 18 inches, and Tua has to go and try and win a game. His lack of confidence because of the snow and cold has already lost his team the game before he even steps on the field for the first snap. He said it himself — it’s about the mindset, and his record in eight games says everything you need to know.
Allen, on the other hand, has had the right mentality heading into cold-weather games, which isn’t shocking for someone who played his college football in Wyoming.
“I think under 10 degrees, it’s just cold. I don’t know how else to describe it,” Allen says of cold-weather games. “But, again, we know certain things to keep our bodies warm and our equipment staff does such a good job of making sure that we have the right tools and equipment to keep warm on the sidelines.”
Allen’s ability in the dome is impressive, and that can be used when the Bills reach the Super Bowl, but for the playoff grind, the best home-field advantage is the cold and snow, not a 68-degree dome in Buffalo.
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