The sports world is full of curses, but none is more feared and revered than “the Madden curse.” And, no, it’s not the kind of cursing that John Madden heads on you when you jump ahead of him in an all-you-cat-eat chili line.

We mean the curse that has been applied to NFL players who appear on the cover of the massively popular EA Sports football video game series. This time, Detroit Lions’ star wide receiver Calvin Johnson will grace the cover of ‘Madden NFL 13’ and every fan Detroit has ever had is in a panic. Frankly, this is just one measly symptom of a full-blown curse. If any of these other symptoms show up on Johnson’s case file, then they should start worrying:

1. You once crossed the path of a black cat over a broken mirror on a cracked sidewalk in King Tut’s tomb.

2. The TV weatherman’s forecast calls for a 100 percent chance of rain about five feet above your head, even indoors.

3. Your ex-wife is a demon in the non-redundant sense.

4. You were the 13th baby born on Jan. 3, 1913 at 1300 hours on the 13th floor at Our Lady of the Holy 13 Hospital.

5. For years, you played for the Red Sox and the season before they won the World Series, you left to play for the Cubs.

6. You crossed “punting a leprechaun” off of your bucket list.

7. Your wife asks you to bring home a live chicken for dinner, even though you’re having fish.

8. You possess the Necronomicon and it’s currently being used to replace one of the missing legs on your couch.

9. You turned King Tut’s sarcophagus into a coffee table.

10. The ‘Evil Dead’ trilogy was based on your life story.

11. When you look back at your family tree, you realize one of your ancestors died on the Titanic, another was on the Hindenburg and you drive a Toyota.

12. You live in a subdivision that guarantees every home has been built on the remains of an Indian burial ground or your money back.

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