FanNation

The Madden Curse.  It's more powerful than the SI Cover Curse, and is starting to crawl into the Great Bambino and the Goat Curse echelon.  Every year the player with the misfortune of gracing the cover has had either a major injury (broken feet, ankle, hamstring problems, etc.) or just a significant drop off from the previous year (Ray Lewis).  It's beyond the point of funny now.  If I were a player and was approached with being on the cover, I would have to decline.  Yeah, believing in such voodoo may seem crazy, but you can't deny with eight years of suffering by Madden Cover players.  I don't know if EA is starting to believe in its own curse or what, but word has leaked that they aren't putting an active player on the cover.  Instead, they are using Brett Favre.

First off, i don't know if this is true, I've only heard it through the grapevine.  Secondly, I am not sure if EA knew that Favre would retire before they made their pick.  Maybe Favre knew and that was why he retired...I really don't know.  Here's what I do know: Favre shouldn't come back unless he wants to get hurt, and while he is working on his property in Mississippi he should watch for pulling objects and sharp implements.  After all, we aren't sure if the Madden Curse extends beyond the gridiron because no retired player has graced the cover before.

If EA knew that Favre was retiring, this is a brilliant decision.  They no longer have the dark cloud of ruining someone's season, or career even (Shaun Alexander, anyone?) if an inactive player is on the cover.  Perhaps they should do this every year and have legends on the cover instead of active players.  Of course, if somethign unfortunate happens to Favre this year while he's on the farm, perhaps they should put people like Osama Bin-Laden on the cover.