Don't Judge Me Madden

NFL football players are insecure. Thus, it should come as no surprise that NFL players care about their Madden ratings. Think of it as an annual reminder that you aren't as awesome as your mom always said you were. Even NFL players who don't play Madden get their jock strap all in a bunch when it comes to feeling slighted by some intern at EA's perception of their football abilities.

I was a role player during my NFL days, never a star, but a solid starter for six of my eight years. One would think that a career like that might translate into a pretty reasonable, meaty-part-of-the-bell-curve rating on Madden. My last NFL season was 2010, so the relevant data point would be Madden 11. Let's take a look.

Overall Rating: 72

OK, I'm not gonna split hairs here; that doesn't jump out to me as egregiously terrible. Most starters tend to be in the high 70s or low 80s, but I was old and slow (or, more accurately, even slow-er than I used to be) by this point, so I can respect the overall rating as in-the-right-ballpark. But, let's dig in a little further on the evaluation here.

We'll start with some of the highs:

Pursuit: 87

Stamina: 86

I suppose pursuit is loosely correlated with speed, so I take it as a compliment that I received high marks in this category. The stamina grade seems nice as well, but when taken in context with the rest of my crappy grading, it basically means that I can play at my same level of sucki-ness longer than most other people. I'm not sure how big of a compliment that is.

Toughness: 81

I'll take an 81 for toughness. I'm assuming linebackers generally get pretty good marks for toughness. We do a lot of hitting. I might have benefitted from a "rising tide" effect here that gave me a better grade than I otherwise deserved. (side note: I'm not really that tough. My medical file was 2 inches thick when I retired. There's some bad ass mofo's in the NFL, especially at the linebacker position. I was not one of them.)

Awareness: 74

This is where things start to go south. Honestly, if there was one thing I could hang my hat on in the NFL, it was my awareness. I was the smart guy. I wasn't that strong; I definitely wasn't that fast; but I tended to know what was going on and be in the right place. What a-hole in EA's Orlando headquarters watched enough tape to decide that I was only worthy of a 74 for awareness? Sadly, Madden was just getting started on all my inadequacies. In fact, that slight pales in comparison to some of my more glaring deficiencies.

Jumping: 49

Elusiveness: 40

Seriously? Just as a reference point, in Madden 25, the Bears' starting offensive line have Jumping ratings of 72, 70, 64, 42, and 40. That's an average of 57.6.

I'm no fantastic leaper, but if we're searching for a decent proxy, my vertical was 37" at my Pro Day. Given the wear and tear over 8 NFL seasons, maybe you figure by that point I was down to about 30". But, my gosh, a 49? How awful do I have to be at jumping that the average of a pretty mediocre offensive line beats me by 8.6 points?

And a 40 for my Elusiveness rating? On a scale of 1 to Barry Sanders, I'm thinking I'm pretty much indiscernible from that fat kid on your Pop Warner team who used to stick a Snickers bar in his pants for a mid-practice snack. (Note: I actually had a teammate do exactly this; but it was a hockey player, and he preferred Twix.)

Sadly it gets worse.

Juke Move: 45

Catching: 26

With a paltry 40 for my Elusiveness, I suppose it would be tough to have a great Juke Move. Luckily, it seems pretty unlikely I would ever have my hands on the ball anyway with a Catching rating of 26. For the record, I had two interceptions in my NFL career (I also once had a Brett Favre pass go through my hands, bounce off my helmet, and still end up as a completed pass to the intended receiver), but surely I deserve better. After all, I only bobbled this one about there times:

Kick return: 12

Throwing Accuracy: 6

Throws computer against wall. First off, I haven't returned a kick since I was in the 7th grade, so they must have really spent some time in the archives to find a accurate rating for my kick return ability. (That kid who forced that fumble was on steroids.) My throwing accuracy – which according to Madden is a weakness relative to my throwing strength of 8 – really brings it all home. "My senile-elderly-woman-type passer ratings" (a line first used by Ethan Albright in his now-infamous reaction to finding out he was the lowest-rated player in Madden 07) might be the hardest pill for a former freshman high school QB to stomach. Was I really that bad? Is that why they moved me to a different position?

My weakness relative the Bears offensive line in Jumping (8.6) was larger than my entire allotment of ability points for my throwing accuracy (6). How is that even possible? Is it all part of some sick mind game EA plays with pro athletes? Why does a kicker need an endurance rating? Why does a quarterback need to have pass defense skills broken down into his ability to play man and his ability to play zone?

It costs us sleep at night, and, as the NFL season kicks off today, EA and Madden have shaken the confidence of many of the 1800 players in the NFL.

Rest easy fans. Take solace in playing Madden without having to feel judged. Throw me some comments below, and I'll try to catch them with my callous, slightly-better-than-having-two-nubs-for-hands, Catching ability of 26.

Hunter Hillenmeyer is an avid gamer, former Chicago Bears Linebacker and President of The Overdog, a site dedicated to bringing gamers and athletes together. Follow him on Twitter and come "wreck shop" with him and other athletes at OverDog.

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