Darren McFadden is the NCAA Football 09 cover athlete (360)

As revealed Wednesday on G4’s X-Play, Arkansas RB Darren McFadden will be the cover athlete for the 360 version of NCAA Football 08. We know that a mascot will be on the cover of the Wii version but that doesn’t explain why they were specific to him being on the cover of the 360 version. Given the developments it won’t be long before EA Sports issues the press release officially announcing this and likely detailing what is going on with the covers for the PS3 and PS2 versions. McFadden will be on today’s episode of X-Play in their “Facetime” segment. Update: More details on the cover situation and the first news about the game can be found here.

When I looked at the top potential cover athletes for this year McFadden was the most obvious choice with a few others like Chris Long, Matt Ryan, and Dennis Dixon trailing behind. McFadden was the highest rated player in NCAA 08 with a 99. Even though it doesn’t appear he will go #1 in the draft you have to look at the name recognition as well as his potential to make an immediate impact in his NFL rookie season (in the same way Adrian Peterson did). That makes for the ideal cover athlete for the NCAA Football series.