Bring Back the Ickey Shuffle! (An NFL season would be sweet, too).
The NFL Lockout has been frustrating for all fans. During a time when we should be looking forward to next season, we’ve been bombarded with stories about how Ray Lewis thinks the extended lockout will cause a rise in crime, or how Cowboys owner Jerry Jones had to receive special permission to attend Tony Romo’s wedding. Screw you lockout. What do I have to look forward to on Sunday’s next fall? Season Three of The Good Wife?
If this lockout continues into September, we won’t only be robbed of the competition, but touchdown celebrations as well. Last year saw a rise in the Dougie. There was Desean Jackson, Braylon Edwards, Taylor Mays, and perhaps the worst rendition done by Lions backup QB Drew Stanton. Hines Ward’s recent victory on Dancing with the Stars may be the closest we come to an end-zone celebration.
Besides being a master of the Samba, Ward also knows how to give props to NFL dancers of old, notably Elbert “Ickey” Woods, a pioneer for the touchdown dance who created the Ickey Shuffle (it starts at about the :56 mark). Ickey was a fullback for the Cincinnatti Bengals in from 1988 to 1991. He scored 15 touchdowns in his rookie season, and helped lead the Bengals to a berth in Super Bowl XXIII where they lost to the San Francisco 49ers, in a game best known for Joe Montana’s leading a 92-yard game winning drive. The league almost banned the dance for the 1989 season. The shuffle even made it into an episode of How I Met Your Mother. It’s a simple dance. First you shuffle to the right with the ball in the right hand, then back to the left, then back to the right, and then you spike the ball. Woods would then twirl his finger in the air. He even shuffled at a charity basketball game in 2009. So bottom line is we need the NFL back. We need the dances, especially the Ickey Shuffle.
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