Thursday, November 17, 2005

Take Cover! There's A New Sports Curse! (NOT)


The "victims" (clockwise, from top): Culpepper, George,
Vick, Lewis, Faulk, McNabb


Maybe the only people pleased about this are the folks at Sports Illustrated.

Did you hear about the new sports curse? It's out there now -- along with SI's cover jinx and anything having to do with a certain football team that plays in Detroit.

Apparently anyone who has appeared on the cover of any "Madden" video game over the past several years is doomed. That's the latest scuttlebutt, especially in the wake of the Eagles' Donovan McNabb's injury. The list includes Daunte Culpepper, Ray Lewis, Eddie George, Michael Vick and Marshall Faulk. They're all past cover boys, and all have met with injuries of various degrees of seriousness.

Excuse me, but these fellas aren't playing tiddlywinks. Football is a tough, brutally violent game. The aforementioned players are some of the game's top stars, which means they tend to find themselves holding the football a lot. Guys who dance around the gridiron holding footballs get hit a lot, if you haven't noticed. So it makes sense that McNabb, et al would get hurt now and then.

This is really too silly to even talk -- or blog -- about, but it's Thursday and it's a slow news day, so indulge me.

According to AOL's poll on the matter, 35% of voters think John Madden's video game has somehow levied a curse on its featured cover stars. Maybe some of the voters danced around a football field, too -- sans helmet.

Speaking of magazine cover curses, Oprah Winfrey is my heroine. She places herself on the cover of every single issue of her "Oprah" magazine. Narcissistic? Probably. But there's a chick who is anything but cursed, and she proves it every month she appears as her own cover girl.

Then again, she doesn't tote pigskins around amongst hulks.

3 comments:

the sports dude said...

Being a self-proclaimed "geek" and owner of the last few madden games (I actually own all of the ones you mentioned there!) I do find it ironic that there seems to some connection between those guys being on the cover and then a serious injury striking. I agree with you that football is a violent sport and those guys being keys to their teams success means they are on the field more and focused upon more by the opposing team. It is just ironic, to me anyway, that none of those guys (to my knowledge at least!) ever had a serious injury until they were put on the cover.

Lastly I would like to say this - if there is a curse then maybe Madden should follow in Oprah's footsteps and put himself on the cover. That way he gets a career threatening injury and that dude gets put out to pasture. Seriously, when was the last time the stuttering old man made any sense?

Later.

Anonymous said...

Guess who is going on every cover of MCS from here on out??

Ian C. said...

Greg, do NOT discount the seriousness of the Madden curse. You've listed all the evidence already, the body of which is becoming too large to ignore.

Should we all cross our fingers for T.O. to be on the cover of next year's game (if he's found a team to play for by then)?