EA’s Madden curse spreads to UFC as Ronda Rousey gets KO’d by Holly Holm

The EA Sports 'Madden' curse has claimed a new victim. On Friday, Ronda Rousey was revealed as the cover start for EA Sports UFC 2. At the time, she was 12-0 and enjoying life as undefeated UFC champion.

On Saturday, all that changed. Rousey, the face of UFC and believed by many to be the most dominant female athlete in the world, was dealt her first career loss. She was knocked out by former professional world boxing champion Holly Holm with a left kick to the head (well, more the neck) in the second round of UFC 193.

Though the curse has normally been reserved for NFL athletes who appear on the cover of EA's annual Madden games, it appears the curse is now spreading. It took only 24 hours for Rousey to feel the effect that NFL athletes unfortunate enough to land on the cover of an EA Sports game have felt for years.

Though Rousey is the first outside of football to be affected by the EA curse, there have been plenty of instances in the NFL of this sort of heartbreaking defeat, including:

• Garrison Hearts (appeared on 1999 PAL cover) – First player to appear on the cover post-John Madden, broke his ankle and was out for two seasons.
• Barry Sanders (appeared on 2000 cover) – Abruptly retired before training camp.
• Daunte Culpepper (appeared on 2002 cover) – Threw 23 interceptions as Vikings went 5-11. Blew out both knees in 2005 and 2006.
• Donovan McNabb (appeard on 2006 cover) – Tore ACL and meniscus.

The list goes on, but as you can see there's plenty of evidence of the Madden Curse. And now it's spreading.

Or you can chalk up Rousey's first loss to her sloppy form against a polished former professional world boxing champion. Holm was just the better boxer, taking advantage of Rousey's openly aggressive approach.

So, curse or just outskilled?