What do you mean by "it didn't work"? Did you successfully close/reload your game and the meter was still gone, or did you lose the in-progress save?
Neither of the above have happened to me, as long as I don't quit the game from Madden's pause menu, and instead just force close the entire application as described above.
Or are you on XBOX where the process might be slightly different (though I assume it still works the same)?