Celebration time: Many once-forbidden displays about to become legal again
Players must still avoid any temptation to twerk
The Louisiana youth coach couldn’t help but notice the deterioration of interest; his players and even his four sons began turning off the NFL game on television to turn on the NFL video game. At least then there’d be personality and showmanship and sizzle, not yellow flags raining down on the field for yet another delay between commercials.
“You have kids playing Madden being bored watching a Sunday game at home,” the coach said. “They’re just looking for the excitement.”
The coach is Joe Horn, the former NFL wide receiver who in 2003 took a bland Sunday night game and poured on the spice. After a second-quarter touchdown catch, Horn got up and ran toward the field goal post, where he had hidden a cellphone. On national television, the New Orleans Saints wideout made what must be the most expensive call in NFL history: a celebration that earned Horn a $30,000 fine.
It helped usher in an era of penalties and fines and letters from the league office taped to players’ lockers — an era, Horn said, that was on the verge of losing the attention of a new generation of fans.
Which, he believes, is why the NFL announced Tuesday it will relax big-play celebration rules that, for much of the past two decades, led some players and fans to refer to America’s most powerful sports outfit as the “No Fun League.”
“We know that you love the spontaneous displays of emotion that come after a spectacular touchdown,” Commissioner Roger Goodell wrote in a letter to fans announcing the changes. “And players have told us they want more freedom to be able to express themselves and celebrate their athletic achievements.”
Beginning next season, it will again be acceptable to use the football as a prop, to celebrate on the ground — the league-issued statement was oddly specific in pointing out the legality of end zone “snow angels” — or for teammates to perform a group demonstration. Twerking, the hip-thrusting dance move preferred by Pittsburgh wide receiver Antonio Brown, remains off-limits; officials can still penalize celebrations they consider taunting in nature or prolonged, according to the letter.
But Odell Beckham Jr., the New York Giants wide receiver and high-flying personality who was fined last season more than $100,000 for various infractions, can now mimic taking end zone photographs of teammates — an act that, combined with salsa dancing by teammate Victor Cruz, got them docked more than $12,000 each — and pretend to kiss as many kicking nets as he wants.
“We should call it what it really is: the Odell Beckham freedom clause,” said Jamal Anderson, the former Atlanta Falcons running back who in 1998 became a household name with his “Dirty Bird” celebration dance. “This is like, let the man go. He’s going to end up like Michael Jackson, man. He may have a sequined glove the first week.”
Goodell’s letter said league officials had spoken with more than 80 current and former players before voting on the new policy during an owners meeting in Chicago. But those discussions were barely necessary after the 2016 season, when television ratings were flat and the league scrambled to find out why.
Owners and league officials blamed an unpredictable presidential campaign, or bloated replays and frequent commercial breaks, or the pregame exploits of former San Francisco quarterback Colin Kaepernick. According to a study conducted last year by the analytics website FiveThirtyEight.com, NFL games grew longer every year from 2008 to 2013 before ticking down in 2014 and spiking again a year later.
Last fall Goodell acknowledged the league, still the richest and most powerful in American sports with its $14 billion in reported revenue last year, had a problem — and badly needed to find a solution.
Nearly two decades after Horn’s “cell-ebration” and Terrell Owens’ sprint to pose on the Dallas Cowboys’ star at midfield and Anderson’s Dirty Bird — “I can’t remember how many times I ended up on the rules videos,” the former Falcons running back said — Goodell indicated in February that maybe his league was in need of a personality injection.
“That’s something we’ll look at,” Goodell said in advance of the Super Bowl in Houston. “But it’s also something that we’ve been dealing with for well over 35 years since I’ve been in the league in the same concept: balancing sportsmanship, avoiding taunting and trying to allow players the ability to express themselves in an exuberant way to celebrate.
“We think that’s great. We want to see more of that.”
Horn suspected Tuesday that the league was responding to some fans’ impatience, particularly when it came at the expense of players showing off their personalities. Over the years he wondered why, if the celebrations were frowned upon, the league allowed video games to include signature demonstrations and why NFL Network, the league’s media arm, appeared to celebrate touchdown celebrations with top-10 shows.
“You’ve got all these superstars who are making millions of dollars, and you’ve got fans who are loving the celebrations,” said Horn, who played for three NFL teams before retiring after the 2007 season. “If you can bring a little spice back to what people really want and stop being a dictatorship over what guys do, you’re not hurting anyone.”
Fourteen years after his own celebration, Horn said he is looking forward to watching the 2017 season. Maybe now his sons, who range in age from 14 to 22, and his youth players will remain engaged long enough to watch along with him.
“That’s what the younger generation wants. I don’t think you can talk to one kid who don’t like seeing the guys act a fool when they score a touchdown,” the retired receiver said. “Maybe Tommy, who’s watching the damn game, maybe he won’t turn the damn channel.”