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America's Favorite Fantasy Football Myth (1 Viewer)

I am not going to claim to have read the whole article. But it seems to focus entirely on the results of the season following the game release. My personal perception was always that the curse pertains more to the entire career of the player. They could go from a #1 WR to a #11 WR and that would be called pretty much a success according to this article. But if the following seasons were #39, #58, and retired, you could say the cover was approximately where they fell off.
 
eighsse2 said:
I am not going to claim to have read the whole article. But it seems to focus entirely on the results of the season following the game release. My personal perception was always that the curse pertains more to the entire career of the player. They could go from a #1 WR to a #11 WR and that would be called pretty much a success according to this article. But if the following seasons were #39, #58, and retired, you could say the cover was approximately where they fell off.
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Thanks. You could well be right. I've always seen it talked about as affecting the season after they appear.

Almost all players eventually flatten for their career.
 
I don't think I've ever thought a single supposed "curse" was real. Definitely not Madden.

Of course I avoided Peyton Hillis after his monster year. Not because of the Madden cover though. I just thought it was unlikely he'd be as successful as the previous year.
 
Joe Bryant said:
eighsse2 said:
I am not going to claim to have read the whole article. But it seems to focus entirely on the results of the season following the game release. My personal perception was always that the curse pertains more to the entire career of the player. They could go from a #1 WR to a #11 WR and that would be called pretty much a success according to this article. But if the following seasons were #39, #58, and retired, you could say the cover was approximately where they fell off.
Click to expand...

Thanks. You could well be right. I've always seen it talked about as affecting the season after they appear.

Almost all players eventually flatten for their career.
Click to expand...
Yeah, true, and I don't know if there is even any better evidence if you include the whole career arc. But even if there is, like you said, they are all going to fall off.
 
Interesting , but it ignores the bigger problem. Let's look at RB seasons following seasons with 300+ carries.

I expect Barkley to have a much more moderate season, and wouldn't judge anyone for fading him a bit based not on the madden cover, but on his workload last year.
 
I don't think I ignored the problem though.

From the article:

Position Matters More Than the Cover​

Let's get a little nerdy for a second. The curse doesn't hit every position the same. Here's how Madden cover stars have finished in fantasy by position:

  • WRs: 4 of 4 finished top-12
  • QBs: 8 of 12 finished top-12
  • RBs: 3 of 6 finished top-12
  • TEs: 0 of 1 (RIP Gronk 2016)
The real culprit here? Running backs. Not because of the curse, but because they get hit 300 times a year. Side note: if you're looking for a real curse, be even more worried if they cross that dreaded 370 carries threshold, as our Gary Davenport explains. The reality is, and orthopedic studies back this up, running backs have the highest injury risk of any position. That's not magic. That's math.
Click to expand...
 
Joe Bryant said:
renesauz said:
Interesting , but it ignores the bigger problem. Let's look at RB seasons following seasons with 300+ carries.
Click to expand...

I got you.

www.footballguys.com

The Curse of 370: Are Saquon Barkley and Ashton Jeanty Next?

Gary Davenport examines the Curse of 370 and its potential impact on fantasy leagues in 2025.
www.footballguys.com www.footballguys.com
Click to expand...
Even worse then I would have guessed. Barkley is a bit of a freak, so expecting a 50%+ reduction in production is probably overboard, but 20-30% is a very reasonable guess. Barring a big injury, he's still a good bet to finish top 5-8, but there's almost zero chance of him approaching his 2024 numbers.
 
renesauz said:
Joe Bryant said:
renesauz said:
Interesting , but it ignores the bigger problem. Let's look at RB seasons following seasons with 300+ carries.
Click to expand...

I got you.

www.footballguys.com

The Curse of 370: Are Saquon Barkley and Ashton Jeanty Next?

Gary Davenport examines the Curse of 370 and its potential impact on fantasy leagues in 2025.
www.footballguys.com www.footballguys.com
Click to expand...
Even worse then I would have guessed. Barkley is a bit of a freak, so expecting a 50%+ reduction in production is probably overboard, but 20-30% is a very reasonable guess. Barring a big injury, he's still a good bet to finish top 5-8, but there's almost zero chance of him approaching his 2024 numbers.
Click to expand...
I'm less worried about his workload and more worried about how, not fluky, but unsustainable that level of play is. Barkley was his usual boom/bust self as a runner last season, but he had a huge OL upgrade, which lead to some really huge plays, but the number was a lot bigger than people think. Barkley had 7 TDs of over 60 yards, nobody in history had more than 4 previously (2012 Peterson)

I'm not saying avoid Barkley or anything like that, but I think that level is extremely unlikely to repeat. He also was barely used in the passing game (by his standards) and Hurts takes the short TDs. I have Barkley at RB3 right now, and probably a mid/late1st rounder.
 
The "curse" is almost by design. EA picks the player who has completely dominated on a level that is not sustainable. That player will eventually (usually the next season) regress toward the mean by either DC game planning or eventual injury. It's not a curse, it's EA picking a statistical outlier to put on the cover and then fans yelling because they never hit that level again.
 
I think I just disagree with the premise of the article being we are happy with a top 12 finish. If a guy is gracing the Madden cover he probably finished top 1, 2, or 3 at his position the previous year. When we are drafting these guys, we want top 5 finishes, not top 12.

If I draft Barkley #1 overall this year, I’m not going to be happy if he puts up the same season James Connor, Jonathon Taylor, or Aaron Jones just did.

14 of the 23 (60%) failed to be top 5 the following year, and 7 of the first 8 failed. So I can see how the curse got started.

A better study would have been to put both years’ finishes down so we can see if they improved or did worse.
 
so, the Madden curse is a Twitter legend? LoL! The curse was a thing before Twitter really became a thing.

Based on my anecdotal evidence, the favorite football myth is that the refs and/or NFL are fixing games.

The Madden curse might be the most fun football myth, since it revolves around a game that is fun. I think the curse is marketed to increase sales.

ETA: I guess I misread the daily email and the article and this thread (except for the part about Twitter). I was talking about football, but if this is framed as a fantasy football myth, then I walk back what I was saying.
 
Last edited:
darksideofoz said:
ETA: I guess I misread the daily email and the article and this thread (except for the part about Twitter). I was talking about football, but if this is framed as a fantasy football myth, then I walk back what I was saying.
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Yes. It's framed as a fantasy football article. I was careful to have that in the title and in the thread title here.
 
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