Vintage Ickey Shuffle Tee 1988

The Ickey Shuffle by Mudge Studios for Salem Sportswear 1988

Elbert "Ickey" Woods played his NFL career with the Cincinnati Bengals. It was during his 1988 NFL Rookie season that Ickey Woods exploded onto the pro football scene rushing for over 1,000 yards and scoring 15 touchdowns.  During Ickey's magical rookie season, he would refine his signature touchdown celebration, dubbed the Ickey Shuffle. It would become a fan favorite.  during that magical season.

 I remember when I was assigned this project while freelancing at Salem Sportswear, The Ickey Shuffle had become a phenomenon. Bengal fans were enjoying a winning season- eventually earning a trip to the Super Bowl, kids everywhere were mimicking the shuffle at their football games and on playgrounds too. In today's terminology, The Ickey Shuffle indeed went viral and this had happened well before the days of YouTube and all of today's hot Social Media stuff.

I also remember that during the late 80's that the NFL began cracking down on taunting and touchdown celebrating. It had something to do with the enforcement of their new planned celebration rule. This not only included touchdown celebrations in the end zone, but to off-field celebrations as well. So, Ickey generally danced his shuffle in proximity to his team's bench near the sidelines and not in the end zone, but now The Ickey Shuffle was actually in danger of becoming banned in the NFL. Fortunately, the NFL ruled that the Shuffle as not considered taunting as it was not performed in plain view of their opponent and it was allowed to continue.

The Ickey Shuffle had really peaked during Ickey's exciting Rookie season. Unfortunately, very early during his second season Woods would tear his Left ACL forcing him to leave the game for more than a year which resulted in him losing his starting spot. Woods returned, but In '91 things didn't go much better for Ickey as he hurt his other knee in preseason. Woods inevitably had left the game at the young age of 26, but not before he left his mark on the league, bringing the NFL one of the most iconic TD celebrations in NFL History… The Ickey Shuffle.