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Published Saturday, October 18, 2008

A chance to sling mud at sports axioms

One of football's more generally accepted and enduring axioms is that bad weather always favors the underdog.

Why is it? Or, is it true at all?

What is it about rain and mud (we'll only consider these two as an example and a consequence of "bad weather") that when they are applied to a person of, shall we say, less talented athletic skills than those recognized in his opponent, he is suddenly equipped to perform better than he would have under more normal climatic conditions?

Does that really happen at all, or only appear to happen?

Is there something about being wet and miserable that motivates a player to block and tackle better, to run harder and to make better decisions than he usually would?

Does being caked in mud hide, as it were, his true identity and enable him to take on, at least temporarily and in disguise, a totally new personality?

I don't know.

But we've all seen instances when teams of lesser caliber beat or come close to beating much better teams when the weather was bad.

Does that mean the weather was the cause?

Bad weather conditions do seem to limit some teams.

For instance, passing teams might not be able to throw and run routes and catch balls quite as proficiently when the ball is wet and the ground slippery.

Teams that rely on quickness and finesse might appear to be not quite so quick or finesseful when their collective feet are mired in mud and muck.

Modern-day facilities and improved turf development and management make playing in adverse conditions much better than in yesteryear.

But it does seem that the game changes when it's raining.

But does it favor one team or the other?

Here are my conclusions for whatever they're worth:

First of all, bad weather conditions to do not give an advantage to an underdog, or an overdog either for that matter, but they sometimes narrow the margin between the two teams (i.e. the games are closer than they would have normally been).

Even though the scores might be closer, studies have shown that, contrary to popular belief, there are no more upsets in bad weather than in good.

Winning and losing, when it's raining, is no different that winning and losing in dry weather. Good teams play good. Bad teams play bad. The only difference is that the final score sometimes is closer when it's raining than when it's dry.

But who's to say that's caused by the weather or the vagaries of the game itself. In other words, that particular game on that particular day might have been closer than expected whether it was raining or not.

Secondly, bad weather does not generally stop teams from doing what they do best. Passing teams pass, running teams run and great defenses play great defense because bad conditions have a corresponding effect on the other team as well.

Thirdly, to say a team won or lost because of the conditions is an oversimplification.

I'm pretty simple minded so I can relate to this one. Winning and losing is a matter of execution and since both teams are executing under the same conditions, it really makes the conditions of none effect.

Fourthly, bad weather does not necessarily inject an underdog with an overflowing amount of new-found confidence or a favorite with a foreboding sense of doom.

It's been my observation that teams accept the conditions under which they have to play as a natural course of the way things are and they make the best of them as their abilities allow.

And fifthly, forget about the teams. Watching games in the rain is generally a miserable experience for fans no matter how well they may believe themselves to be protected from the elements.

Football in the rain is a necessary evil if you're a fan, but that doesn't mean you have to like it.

Give me a sunny day or a starry night any time. Rain is for farmers and gardeners.

Bad weather doesn't favor anyone, especially those of us who watch.

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