BUCN Perfect : Grilli and the SI Curse

I wrote this last Wednesday, but I feel like now is a good time to share it with you all:
Superstitions are rampant among athletes of every sport; even as a gymnast I had a certain routine when I lined up in the corner for a tumbling pattern. My feet had to be perfectly lined up with the white corners before I felt comfortable taking off down the floor. Some baseball players hop over the baselines when exiting the field, hockey players don't change their socks, and football stadiums play certain songs at certain times in games.
As a Pittsburgh Pirates fan, I was overjoyed yet also mortified to see Jason Grilli on the cover of the new Sports Illustrated. We've all heard of the Sports Illustrated curse, and I have to be somewhat concerned about the truth behind it. The SI curse is so well known that the magazine dedicated a 2002 cover to it, black cat included. In case you don't follow baseball, the Pirates haven't had a winning season in over 20 years. The past 3 years, they have entered the All Star break on fire, only to completely implode and collapse in the second half of the season.
This year, the Pirates have entered the All Star break one game back from the first place Cardinals in the NL Central. They’re 56-37 and looking to capitalize on their first half success. In the 2010 season, the Pirates only won 57 games ALL YEAR. This year we had 5 players named as All Stars, those 5 guys more than the Yankees and Red Sox had combined. We had Pedro Alvarez in the Home Run Derby and he just missed the cutoff to the 2^nd round. Alvarez hit more HRs in the Derby than the last 4 Pirates players combined.
Jason Grilli has been lights out as the Pirates closer this season; he has ONE blown save. He’s earned the nicknames Grilled Cheese, the Big Cheese, and along with set up guy Mark Melancon, Mark and Cheese. Pirates fans have warmed up to Grilli quickly after notoriously being bitter about the trade of last year’s closer, Joel Hanrahan. Grilli dubbed the Pirates bullpen the “Shark Tank,” and had an actual shark tank brought into the clubhouse. He’s been the veteran leader of the amazing Bucco bullpen since the start of the season. So you see why this cover makes us nervous.

SI reported that they found jinxes affected roughly 37% of the featured cover athletes. Wikipedia lists about 100 instances of the jinx and its repercussions on athletes and teams if you want to see cold hard proof. Everything from broken bones, car accidents, blowing key games, you name it, its most likely there. Scary, considering the Pirates’ collapses the past few seasons. The last thing we need is some voodoo curse hanging over our team.
Just to play devil’s advocate, let’s look at the jinx in another light. Some theories propose that the jinx isn’t really a jinx, that it has more to do with the player returning to being average. The athletes who appear on the covers are ones having a breakout season, shattering records, or otherwise doing something above average for their sport. The thought behind this theory is that eventually, athletes all become average again because their phenomenal performance isn’t sustainable. Makes sense once you sit down and think about it, right?
Is it really a curse? Black cats, jinxes, and voodoo raining bad luck on the athletes? Or is it just an above average player becoming average again? I’ll leave it up to you to decide.