Dodgers-Astros: Hottest World Series ever?

First pitch for Tuesday’s Game 1 in L.A. is forecast at 95 to 97 degrees, a record for any Major League Baseball playoff game, period.

For the first time in 15 years, the World Series will be contested under the sunny skies of Southern California.

But Tuesday’s Game 1 between the Houston Astros and Los Angeles Dodgers won’t necessarily be comfortable: There’s a chance it will be the hottest World Series game on record. A heat warning will be in effect in Los Angeles when the Dodgers and Astros face off at 5:09 p.m. PT, with a forecast of 95 to 97 degrees at first pitch. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Alex Lamers says that will put the game right on the cusp of heat history.

The hottest game-time temperature for a World Series game — any playoff game, in fact — was 94 degrees for Game 1 between the Arizona Diamondbacks and New York Yankees on Oct. 27, 2001. Though the Diamondbacks typically play with their Chase Field roof closed under such conditions, Major League Baseball had decreed that the roof stay open, as is its prerogative for jewel events.

Though the effect on athletes accustomed to playing in such conditions may be minimal, 55,000 fans arriving in the late afternoon may find conditions far from ideal.

John Thorn, MLB’s official historian, posted on Twitter that no World Series game in a non-roofed facility has been played at a temperature above 81 degrees since 1975, according to league records. He also cited a CNN reporter’s discovery of four games before 1975 that were played on days when the temperature eclipsed 90 degrees.