Madden curse-o-meters:
Madden 2012 - Peyton Hillis
Voted to the cover after a season of 331 touches. was the first "fan vote", and won it because of his workmanlike and punishing running style.
Injury surprise-o-meter: 0.9%
Madden 2011 - Drew Brees
Was not injured. Threw for over 4600 yards. The only bad luck befell the Saints, with Bountygate.
Madden 2010 - polamalu/fitzgerald
Double curse!
Polamalu plays the safety position physically and fitzgerald is the go-to guy on his team. Both players played through a long post-season. Both played through the playoffs in the post season and into the superbowl. Polamalu tore his MCL. Fitz got a broken thumb.
Injury SHOCKOMETER: 3%, only because both players got hurt.
Madden 09
Brett Favre. Old. On a crappy Jets team.
Injury WTF Meter: 0.0003%
Madden 08 Vince Young
Had a pretty good year leading the titans to 10-6 and the wild card. He did begin the next season with an injury but also just wasn't very good.
Madden 07 Shaun Alexander
Got a big contract, broke his foot, and wasn't the same player ever again. Obviously, this one hits close to home and therefore carries a little more 'madden curse' weight. But lets not forget the previous season was a long one due to the post-season superbowl run (The 05 SB was played in 06 and madden 07 came out in august of 06).
Alexander touched the ball 385 times in the regular season alone, let alone the post-season.
I'm so surprised he got injured! rating: we are the 1%
Madden 06 - donovan mcnabb
Once again another player who played well into the post-season and the superbowl gets hurt. (Anyone advocating an 18 game schedule paying attention here?) He hurt his groin. He also had to deal with a TO bitchout.
Actually sorta maybe a little surprised o meter: 4%
Madden 05 - Ray Lewis
A wrist injury kept him out for one game. He did injure his hammy the next season, but that's not curse territory, and he went on to obviously have plenty more decorated years and another ring. If that's a curse then i'll take it.
Dont-care-bout-no-curse-meter: 0.0007%
Madden 04 - Michael Vick
Another post-season player, and one who plays a risky mobile QB game.
However he gets the highest rating on the curse-scale because he broke his leg in a pre-season game the day after Madden 04 was released, making it the most 'weird dood' one of all of them.
Curse-be-possible score: 11%
Madden 03 - Marshall Faulk
Was not injured for more than a couple games due to minor issues, which is completely reasonable after 8 straight seasons of 1000+ yards and a few 2000+ total yard campaigns.
well duh-cursey factor: 0.01%
Madden 02 - Duante Culpepper
had knee surgery after 11 games in an otherwise bleak year for the vikings. A couple seasons later he would also set the then NFL record for total yards.
Curse bleh meh - 1.2%
Madden 2001 - Eddie George
No injury, except to his pride in a critical playoff fumble.
Curse-be-gone: 0.00
Madden 2000 Barry Sanders (appeared behind john madden in the box art but not a feature player)
Barry Sanders wasn't injured. He retired. No curse, sorry. Just a man tired of being the only baller on a sad hat team.
Curse factor: 0.00 (ZERO POINT ZERO-ZERO)
Madden 2000 Dorsey Levensomethingorother (Appeared on an alternative box art for madden 2000)
Got injured. Whoooooo. the Mr. Irrelevant of the Curse draft.
Curse factor: 0.03%