21 years and counting. Every year it turns average guys and girls into living room head coaches and general managers and in just over a month, we’ll all be lined up to get our copy. August 14 if you want to be exact. And the question this year will be the same its been for the last 10 years: will this year’s cover boy or boys finally break the curse?
Look, I have my quirks but I don’t consider myself a very superstitious person. But anyone who doesn’t think there’s something to this “Cover Curse” is kidding their self.
Lets take a look back, the victims, er, cover boys, their injuries and subsequent decline.
Madden 1999: Garrison Hearst. This was the first year someone other than Madden was featured on the cover. Hearst had a terrific season that year. Look at the line: 2105yds from scrimmage, nine touchdowns. Second round of the playoffs against Atlanta, first quarter, one carry for seven yards and one broken ankle. Hearst would be sidelined for two full seasons from that injury.
Madden 2000: Barry Sanders silhouetted just over Madden’s shoulder. 1,500 yards away from breaking Walter Payton's (then) all-time rushing record; Sanders suddenly retires just seven days before training camp. Maybe Barry knew something was up.
Madden 2001: Eddie George. George would have his best year as a pro the year he was featured on the game’s cover.
Averaging about 1,400 yards and eight touchdowns a season up until that point, George would break the thousand yard mark just two more times, barely, running for 1,165 yards in 2002 and 1,031 yards in 2003.
He would go on to play just four more seasons after being featured on the game, never seeing the same success. George was out of the league at 31.
Madden 2002: The Vikings Daunte’ Culpepper was the first ever quarterback on the cover. Culpepper’s likeness on “Madden 02” followed a season where he threw 33 touchdown passes and had a 98.0 quarterback rating.
The Madden year, Culpepper missed five games, threw for 1,300 fewer yards and finished with a pedestrian 14 touchdowns and 11 picks.
He’d go on to have two Pro Bowl seasons a few years later, but his career has since went down in flames. I’d like to think this might have had just as much to do with Randy Moss bolting for Oakland as it did the jinx…but that’s a whole other column.
Madden 2003: Back to the running backs. Marshall Faulk was hands down the best running back in the NFL at the time and possibly the league’s best player. Top three at the very least.
Faulk would make the Pro Bowl on reputation only that season, starting only 10 games, rushing for 953 yards and 8 touchdowns. That was the start of a rapid decline and Faulk would be out of football in just three seasons later.
Madden 2004: Michael Vick. The most physically gifted player in NFL. In just two years in the league, Vick would become the face of the NFL and the highest paid player in league history.
His Madden cover season ended before it began, as he got knocked out two thirds of the season after getting his leg broken in a meaningless preseason game. I don’t need to get too much into the rest of Vick’s career. Let’s just move on.
Madden 2005: Ray Lewis, the first defensive player to ever be on the cover of the game. Like Hearst and George, Lewis somehow managed to foil the bad mojo during his season on the cover. Granted, he did miss one game due to injury and his numbers were down slightly, but Lewis still managed to make the Pro Bowl.
But like George and Hearst (got hurt in the playoffs), Lewis would have his most trouble the following season, playing only five games after eventually being sidelined by a hamstring injury. But, he seems to not have been too affected by the jinx making three Pro Bowls since coming back from injury.
Madden 2006: Donovan McNabb. Before his season on the cover, McNabb went to five straight Pro Bowls. But the 2005 season would be one for McNabb to forget after playing only nine games before missing the rest of the season due to hernia surgery. He hasn’t been to one Pro Bowl since.
Madden 2007: Shaun Alexander. Fresh off of his 1,880 yard, 27 touchdown campaign that saw his Seahawks in the Super Bowl, Alexander’s cover season would be shortened by a broken foot. He would never gain 1,000 yards in a season again and at 31 years old, found him self backing up Clinton Portis and Ladell Betts on the Redskins.
Madden 2008:
4 Comments
Loading more comments...
This comment and all replies have been deleted This comment has been deleted Undo delete