Despite Odell Beckham Jr’s Addition, Tyreek Hill’s Dolphins’ Unlikely to Challenge for SB as ‘Cold’ Kansas City Loss Continues to Haunt Miami

The Miami Dolphins made the news once again after signing Odell Beckham Jr. to a one-year worth of up to $8.25 million for the season. But despite having an outstanding receiver depth, the Dolphins always choke in cold weather. We saw it last season when the team had to battle the Buffalo Bills and the Kansas City Chiefs last year.

The Miami team’s fate was crushed at the hands of the Chiefs as they played in arguably one of the coldest games in the league’s history in Arrowhead. Some analysts think that the déjà vu is bound to happen all over again this year. One thing is for sure, if the Dolphins want to progress in the playoffs, they need to be accustomed to cold weather.

Would the Miami Dolphins get a frostbite this year with Odell Beckham Jr. on their side?

The First Things First hosts had a deep conversation about OBJ joining the Dolphins as their WR3. The hosts still think that the Miami team won’t go any further this year because they will encounter teams like the Bills, Chiefs, Steelers, and Bengals in the playoffs. As prolific as their roster is, Nick Wright and his colleagues think that the Dolphins will choke this year.

Chris Broussard pointed out, “These are the teams that could make the playoffs. We know some of them definitely will, could make the playoffs and Miami’s going to have to beat them and it’s probably going to be below 40 degrees in those cities.” But Nick Wright countered Broussard’s position.

The M&T Bank Stadium was cold when the Ravens blew the Dolphins out in a 56-19 game. Later, the Miami Dolphins suffered at the hands of the Kansas City Chiefs at Arrowhead in a 26-7 game in the Wild Card round. While Mahomes and Co. were attuned to the temperature, the Dolphins found it excruciating to pick up their pace. The only touchdown that the Miami team had was when Tagovailoa passed the ball to Hill in the second quarter. Only Tyreek Hill out of everyone on the roster had experience playing in the cold.

However, the Dolphins can avoid these “cold” problems if they just keep winning games and get a home-field advantage. But to get to that point, the team will need everyone to be on their A-game, which can’t be said about OBJ due to multiple reasons.

Why the Dolphins can’t rely on OBJ to get them playoff victories

A look into OBJ’s past can tell us why a short-term deal with the receiver isn’t the best possible outcome for this team. The Dolphins’ new WR3 has injured himself 18 times in his career. Some of the most concerning injuries are his fractured left ankle, multiple ACL tears, multiple hamstring tears, and a couple of bruises here and there.

The reason why injury history is so important is because these injuries come back to haunt an athlete when it’s cold. Also, if the team is playing in sub-40 temperatures, it would require OBJ, or any other injured athlete for that matter to take special care of their wounds. Hence, the team needs to strategize when they will use the receiver and for what.

A study by Draft Picks suggests that OBJ has a 61% chance of getting injured this season. They also assessed that he has a 5.4% probability of getting injured per game and is projected to miss 4.40 games this season. If that happens, the Dolphins will be the same old team that they were last year.

Hence, the only way to lift the curse is to win games and have a home-field advantage to avoid playing in the cold weather in the first place.