Well the Madden Curse has already taken effect,Hillis has a partial hamstring tear
2001- on fill in future blanks.
2001: The 2001 cover of Madden NFL featured Tennessee Titans running back Eddie George, who the previous year had led his team to the Super Bowl (where they came up just short against the St. Louis Rams). Although George enjoyed his best season ever (in terms of yards gained rushing and touchdowns scored) in 2000, he bobbled a pass (that was subsequently intercepted and returned for a touchdown) in the Titans' season-ending Divisional Playoff loss to the Baltimore Ravens, and the following season, hampered by injuries, he saw his rushing average sink to an all-time low.
2002: The 2002 cover of Madden NFL featured Minnesota Vikings quarterback Daunte Culpepper, who the previous year had made an impressive NFL debut in taking his team to the NFC Championship Game (which they lost to the New York Giants). In 2001, however, the Vikings struggled to a disappointing 4-7 record before Culpepper suffered a knee injury and missed the last five games of the year (while Minnesota finished the season a dismal 5-11).
2003: The 2003 cover of Madden NFL featured St. Louis Rams running back Marshall Faulk, whose rushing and receiving prowess had led his team to the Super Bowl twice in the previous three years. But Faulk was plagued by an injured ankle during the 2002 season, his yards gained rushing total dropped under the 1,000 mark (after four straight seasons of 1300+ yards), and the Rams missed the playoffs with a disappointing 7-9 record.
2004: The 2004 cover of Madden NFL featured Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick, who in 2002 (his first season as a starter) took a team with a dismal 16-32 record over the previous three years and led them to a respectable 9-6-1 finish and a spot in the NFL playoffs as a Wild Card entry. In 2003, though, Vick suffered a fractured right fibula in a pre-season game one day after Madden NFL 2004 hit store shelves; he played in only five games that year as the Falcons sank to a lowly 5-11 record.
2005: The 2005 cover of Madden NFL featured Baltimore Ravens linebacker Ray Lewis, who had recorded a career-high six interceptions in 2003 as his team reached the post-season for the third time in four years. But in 2004, Lewis failed (for the only time in his NFL career) to record even a single interception and sat out the final game of the season with an injury as the Ravens just missed qualifying for the playoffs at 9-7, and in 2005 he suffered a torn right hamstring in Baltimore's sixth game and missed the rest of the season as the Ravens dropped to 6-10.
2006: The 2006 cover of Madden NFL featured Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Donovan McNabb, under whom the Eagles had amassed a superb 59-21 regular season record and made five straight playoff appearances in the previous five years, the last of which culminated in an NFC Championship and a Super Bowl match-up against the New England Patriots (which Philadelphia lost by three points). After he was selected for the 2006 Madden NFL cover, McNabb flouted the curse by saying that the injuries associated with it "might be a trend, but I don't believe in the curse at all." True to form, McNabb suffered a sports hernia in the first game of the 2005 season. He played on for another eight games despite the painful injury, but after being re-injured in a contest against the Dallas Cowboys, he finally opted for surgery and missed the final seven games of the season as the Eagles finished last in the NFC East.
2007: The 2007 cover of Madden NFL featured Seattle Seahawks running back Shaun Alexander, whose 5.1 yards per carry rushing average in 2005 spurred the Seahawks to their best season ever and their first Super Bowl appearance. Three weeks into the 2006 season, Alexander broke his left foot in a game against the New York Giants and missed his team's next six games. The Seahawks made the playoffs but lost to the Chicago Bears in the second (divisional) round.
2008: The 2008 cover of Madden NFL featured Tennessee Titans rookie quarterback Vince Young, who skipped his senior year in college to enter the NFL after leading the University of Texas Longhorns to a national championship and was selected #3 in in the 2006 draft. Young hurt the quadriceps in his right leg during the Titans' fifth game of the 2007 season and didn't participate in Tennessee's game against the Houston Texans the following week, marking the first time in his career (including middle school, high school, college, and the NFL) that an injury kept him from playing,
As we explain at length in our article about the Campbell's Chunky Soup curse, such superstitions are in a sense inevitable. Players are generally selected for honors when they're at the pinnacles of their careers — when continued excellence has become the expected norm, and when anything less is considered disappointing. There's nowhere to go from such lofty heights but down: Every player is subject to injury (especially in a contact sport such as football), all athletes eventually experience the decline of their skills with age (if injuries don't prematurely end their careers first), and even top performers are not immune to having off-years or making occasional blunders in crucial game situations. "Bad luck" happens to just about everyone sooner or later, but we only take especial note of it when it seems to fit a pattern.
Last updated: 21 October 2007
Urban Legends Reference Pages © 1995-2011 by Barbara and David P. Mikkelson.
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Sources Sources:
Ginsburg, David. "Ray Lewis Out for Season with Hamstring Injury."
The Washington Post. 7 December 2005.
Hruby, Patrick. "Covering the Blues."
ESPN.com 11 August 2003.
Lewis, Nick. "The Madden Curse."
The Edmonton Journal. 23 August 2006.
Morris, Chris. "Will Ray Lewis Be Cursed?"
CNNMoney.com 7 May 2004.
Penner, Mike. "Curses Are Reality to Fantasy Leaguers."
Los Angeles Times. 27 August 2006.
Rovell, Darren. "Cover and Out? McNabb Latest Madden Star to Fall."
ESPN.com 21 November 2005.
Solomon, Jerome. "Only Time Will Tell If Young Can Play."
Houston Chronicle 18 October 2007.
NFL.com. "Alexander Out with Cracked Bone in Foot."
25 September 2006.
