The Madden NFL Curse..

something strange has been going on in the nfl a curse it's said that when a player appears on the cover of madden their career is instantly ruined and a young garrison hearst didn't know it yet but he'd be the first victim september 6th 1998 the 49ers were going up against the new york jets in an overtime thriller the score is tied 30-30 whoever scores next wins the game the 49ers snap and hand the ball off to garrison hurst all the way back in their own end zone what many thought would be a typical running play turned into one of the greatest plays in nfl history garrison took that snap and ran the ball 96 yards for a walk-off touchdown ending the game right then and there and with that play garrison solidified himself as a star in the nfl and became madden's first ever cover athlete but just four months later it happened the 49ers were playing against the falcons in the playoffs fighting for a chance at the super bowl it was the first play of the game the 49ers snapped handed the ball off to garrison and the world was ready to watch another historic moment and they got a historic moment but i don't think it's what people expected garrison tried to spin out of a tackle and his cleat got caught in the turf causing his leg to snap garrison went through the entire recovery process but things were never the same following surgery garrison had circulation issues cutting off the blood supply to his leg and causing the talus bone in his foot to die officially forcing him into retirement and becoming the first ever victim of the madden curse and i know you're thinking that's just one example what about the 22 other cover athletes did the curse affect them like surely this was just a coincidence right that's what the nfl thought until the next year coming into 1999 madden needed a new cover athlete and around this time barry sanders was dominating the league all throughout the 90s he was putting up some of the greatest numbers in nfl history he rushed for around 1500 yards each season it was being called one of the greatest running backs ever so barry was blessed with the madden 2000 cover but that's when the unexpected happened at the peak of his career barry just vanished he wasn't answering any phone calls he wouldn't respond to coaches or teammates no one knew what was going on until an ominous farewell letter popped up in the news saying nothing more than my desire to exit the game is greater than my desire to remain in it marking the end of his legendary career this made literally no sense who just retires out of nowhere at the peak of their career at the time this madden curse wasn't a well-known topic it's not something people were speculating about but looking back now it's almost like barry saw what happened to garrison hurst the year before and decided to call it a quits before something terrible happened to him madden was then forced to change their cover athlete to dorsey lovins who ended up suffering a nagging injury so it looked like barry might have been right but how much truth is there to this is this curse real or was barry just crazy well it looks like barry made the right choice let me show you why 2002 dante culpepper 2003 marshall falk 2004 michael vick 2005 ray lewis 2006 donovan mcnabb 2007 sean alexander every single one of those players were the cover athlete for madden and that same year every one of them suffered near career ending injuries these guys were all at the top of their careers and the worst thing possible happened to each of them at this point the madden curse started dominating the news everybody talks about this madden curse and now michael vick well he graced the madden cover back in 2004 and promptly suffered a broken leg missing the first 11 games of the season vince young's quad chance injury or madden curse i believe it's a curse wilbur obj will not avoid the madden curse this became a topic that everyone was talking about including players and fans so when the 08 cover was in development fans took it into their own hands to try and stop this curse for good at the time ea offered the 08 madden cover spot to ladainian tomlinson he was coming off a record-breaking mvp season it was already one of the best running backs in league history so it just made sense ea was offering ladainian two hundred thousand dollars just to be pictured on the game but was it worth it charger fans didn't think so a fan named nick couplow was convinced the curse was real and he didn't want to see his favorite player become a victim so he started an online petition saying with everyone's help i plan to forward this petition to ea to try and convince them to choose another candidate for the cover of madden and this petition caused a lot of commotion online and in the nfl leading lt to consult with his manager ultimately deciding it'd be better for his career to not risk anything imagine turning down an opportunity like this being on the cover of madden is something that every nfl pro dreams of but with the world starting to see the curse that started changing this is how real the madden curse is man and this is where people and the pros started to believe in it but not everyone was convinced yet and madden games sell themselves doesn't matter who's on the cover so ea didn't really care and they went with vince young instead but what's really interesting about vince young is how he decided to handle this curse he did an interview with jimmy kimmel to talk about the season and the madden cover and jimmy asked him about the curse i mean it's scaring everyone was vince worried about it well he clearly wasn't too worried because he decided to mock the curse in front of the entire world you know there's a curse associated with this game and every year guys say i'm not worried about it and then every year something seems to happen well i didn't prayed about it and we're going to go on and try to get to the playoffs and try to get to super bowl we'll see what happens yeah but if something happens god forbid will you blame the game for this no you know definitely won't do that but you know no not at all okay well i will i don't know if that was a good idea vince immediately after this happened the curse went to work vince had the slowest start he ever had to a season and just a few weeks in he suffered a devastating quad injury vince figured it was just a coincidence and he took a few weeks to recover and was ready to go but his first game back vince injured himself again the titans knew something was going on and they didn't want to take any more chances that year so they sent vince to the bench and he went from a starter to a backup quarterback and that's how he played out the rest of the season damn two injuries losing your spot on the roster it can't get worse right well after a year of sitting on the sidelines the titans decided to give him one more chance to redeem himself going into the next season vince was the starting quarterback once again and he was ready to prove that this curse is nothing but nonsense playing in the opening game of the season against the jaguars vince was off to a strong start the titans were up 17-10 things were actually going his way but one play changed everything down the stretch in the third quarter jaguar's linebacker dale smith collided with vince's left leg sending vince down with a knee injury he was only supposed to be out two to three weeks but coach jeff fisher decided to bring in a new quarterback instead for the next year and a half carrie collins took over the spot but in 2009 the titans started the season zero and six with carrie collins so vince got a call that he was getting another chance and as soon as he got off the phone he went to work he turned the titans around won 8 out of 10 games and led them to an 8-8 record it wasn't great but things were at least looking bright for vince until the next season the titans started that year off four and five and in week 11 it happened again during a game against the redskins vince suffered a torn flexor tendon in his throwing hand he went to the locker room got his hand evaluated taped up and then returned to the field to play but coach jeff fisher said no he was getting injured too often so vince threw his uniform and pads in the crowd and stormed out he knew this was the beginning of the end for his career he was done for most of the season and vince never truly recovered from this he went from throwing 2 500 yards in a season with the titans to 866 with the eagles the man threw four touchdowns and nine interceptions in six games so with no teams wanting him he retired from the nfl just a couple of years later and just like that vince became another victim of the madden curse at this point 9 out of 10 cover athletes have had their career ruined but that was all years ago you know it still could just be a coincidence right what about present day well from 2010 to 2018 it kept happening careers and lives were being ruined an injury to troy polamalu the worst season of drew brees and peyton helles career injury and scandals coming out of nowhere to adrian peterson odell beckham jr on top of the league then boom injuries and a team switch that left him trapped to this day rob gronkowski was the face of the lead he made the cover and the curse hit him harder than any defensive player ever could injury after injury forced to watch the super bowl from the sidelines and eventually forced into retirement the curse struck again and again but if you're still not convinced there's one more player who was affected by this curse worse than anyone in 2018 antonio brown was having an unreal year he caught 104 passes for 1300 yards and 15 touchdowns and he was already doing this for a record amount of seasons in a row so it's only right madam made him the cover athlete but even though he was great throughout the season coming into the final week of the year is where things got weird antonio started causing drama in the locker room and a heated argument between him and ben roethlisberger got antonio benched his teammates blamed the 68 million dollar contract getting to his head but others felt something else was going on and after making the cover of madden 19 antonio started skipping practices and demanded to be traded that off season shortly after antonio was traded to the raiders and more eyes were on him than ever but what's different with antonio's situation is that you could actually see the curse get a hold of him coming into training camp antonio was diagnosed with the most random health concern possible for someone in his shoes after going through cryotherapy treatment his feet attracted an unusual frostbite which didn't really make sense but when you look at the details of a madden game ironically the ea game runs on a software engine called frostbite it's like this curse was showing itself to the world after this happened you could tell the pressure of the superstition was on antonio's mind at all times and during that off-season things got even weirder it's common for the nfl to make uniform rule adjustments and coming into the next season they banned players from wearing certain helmets featured on madden covers one of which was antonio's favorite so this pushed things over the top random injuries the nfl placing bans antonio saw these weird things happening as signs from above so he freaked out and made headlines saying that he was retiring from football if he wasn't allowed to wear his helmet at the time no one understood why this helmet meant so much to him but it was because he was so comfortable wearing it and switching to something else would risk him making mistakes in the field and with the madden curse in full effect antonio didn't want to take any more chances it was more than football at stake his life was on the line that season but the nfl wouldn't budge they denied antonio's request to wear his own helmet but he couldn't just sit back and accept that so antonio looked for any reason to get out of playing that season he started beefing with new teammates skipping practices and he was fined tens of thousands of dollars for this and if that wasn't enough antonio went on twitter and instagram rants bashing his team and the league and with that he was dropped from the raiders without playing a single game but the curse knew antonio was onto it so it followed him into his life outside of football if things only got worse for antonio moving forward scandals came out and his career was officially ruined antonio was kicked out of the nfl and to this day no one can explain what was going on with them the only explanation that makes sense is that the curse struck once again and the same goes for the most recent cover athlete lamar jackson he became a face of madden after an mvp season where he threw over 3 000 yards and rushed for over a thousand but after lamar made the cover it was brought up that he was facing more than just the madden curse lamar didn't deal with any serious injury during the season but he did get covet and that's nothing to take lightly just when you think he escaped the curse in the biggest game of his career it happened lamar had a bad snap go over his head as he chased the ball down so he threw the ball out of bounds and as he did that boom he took a hit from two bills defenders and laid on the turf as if he got struck by lightning lamar was diagnosed with a concussion so only time will tell how this affects his career moving forward coming into this video i wasn't sure how real a curse could be but 17 out of the 23 cover athletes had their careers ruined or at least horribly effective that's a 74 chance that if you make the cover of madden your career won't survive it it does sound crazy you know i don't know if it's the pressure or coincidence but i think it's safe to say this curse is very real and to the next madden cover i wish you luck man but you know some players don't need a curse to ruin their career they did it themselves so to find out how click on this video whether they gained hundreds of pounds or became a felon there's a lot of different ways nfl players let themselves go so what are you doing man click on it

Channel: TOUCHDOWN

Views: 4,272,213

Keywords: Touchdown Central, NFL, touchdown, madden

Id: W5HvXRqhee4

Length: 15min 26sec (926 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 01 2021