The Jersey Curse

I've been kicking this story around for a while. Not sure if it was a worthy thing to write about, recently though, Minnesota Twins pitcher Pat Neshek injured his elbow and is now injured for the season. The signifigance of this injury is that it happened roughly 3 weeks after I bought myself a Neshek jersey shirt.
For the last few years, I've joked that whenever I buy a jersey, I jinx the player. Sometimes it's a minor jinx somtimes major...so I've decided to document a historical walkthrough of the curse.
1996, Rashaan Salaam, Chicago Bears: After a solid rookie season (1995) where Salaam rushes for over 1,000 yards and 10 TD's I make my very first jersey purchase at the age of 14 using money I saved up from mowing lawns over a summer. However, Salaam would never come close to the success he had during that first season. By the end of 1997 he would be out of the NFL for the first time (he would make brief cameos in 1999 and 2003).
1999, Cade McNown, Bears: I picked up my McNown jersey before the start of the 2000 season. Things looked good for all of--oh, one week--as McNown played a solid game in Week 1 against Minnesota. Then it began to go downhill. McNown was pulled as the Bears QB by Week 7 and never started another game in the NFL.
2001, Jim Flanigan, Bears: Perhaps you are starting to see a trend growing here. I buy a Bears jersey--player X sucks as soon as the season starts. This is where that trend breaks. You see, after aquiring the jersey in the offseason, Flanigan got cut during the PRESEASON! I'll just move on...
June 19 2003 Jay Williams: I wish I was kidding with this one. I'm not. I promise. I picked up my away red Williams jersey while I was in Chicago visiting family. I returned to my grandmother's house after buying the jersey--turned on the TV...and saw that Williams was in a motercycle accident that day. For whatever reason, I hadn't taken the tags off the jersey yet and proceeded to return the jersey to the store the next day. I did exchange the jersey, oh yeah. I exchanged it for...
...June 20 2003, Mark Prior, Cubs: Do I really need to go on about how this one screwed me? You're probably thinking long term (2004-2008) here, but remember Prior's first freak injury occured a measly 3 weeks after purchasing this jersey (Prior and Marcus Giles had an on-field collision on July 11 forcing Prior to miss the All Star game and a few starts).
2004, Moises Alou, Cubs: Picked up this shirt during the final series of the season in 2004 against the Atlanta Braves. I forgot my Prior jersey in Minnesota and needed to get a Cubs shirt for the game. Alou left after the season as a free agent.
2005, Tyson Chandler, Bulls: Again, nothing bad really happened to Chandler. He just underacheived in Chicago. He was traded after the 2006 season to New Orleans for P.J. Brown and J.R. Smith (the latter of which was released almost immediatly). You'd think I'd be done buying Bulls jerseys for good but then...
2005, Ben Gordon, Bulls: Nothing bad has happened to Gordon yet...but he could very well be on his way out of Chicago this offseason (then again, this jersey was bought for me as a gift so he might be immune to the curse).
2005, Michael Barrett, Cubs: I picked up this jersey on another Wrigley Field trip, only to watch Barrett get into fights with his pitchers in the dugout during the 2007 season (to think, this is probably the least cursed jersey out of the bunch), before he was traded midseason.
2008, Pat Neshek, Twins: The whole reason this article was written. Pat, I am truly sorry. I feel like I am the reason you are done for the season.
So, there are a few things to learn here. I'm not sure if it's me cursing the jerseys or the fact that I've cheered for some crap-ass teams over the last decade or so. Either way, out of all the jerseys I own, Gordon and Neshek are the only ones still with said team. Chandler is playing great basketball for another team. Prior is still injured--Williams, Flanigan, McNown, Salaam are out of their respective leagues. The new rule is only jerseys of players who have retired (Ryne Sandberg...I wore the Flanigan jersey during Super Bowl XLI). Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go buy an Adrian Peterson Vikings jersey (I gotta help the Bears out with this jersey curse for once).