30 best NFL touchdown celebrations of all-time
By John Buhler
15. The Dirty Bird
Atlanta has been a hot bed of the hip hop culture for some time. A lot of cool things come out of Atlanta, but not championships, mostly dance moves. There was a time where the Atlanta Falcons came out of nowhere to win the NFC in 1998. Running back Jamal Anderson and head coach Dan Reeves even had a signature dance move that took the NFL by storm: The Dirty Bird.
It was part Macarena, part Ickey Shuffle. The Dirty South Chicken Dance was a lot of jumping and flapping wings and everybody in Atlanta was doing it that one year when they weren’t gridlocked in traffic, excited about another riveting day at the IBM office.
Atlanta went 14-2 that year and stunned the No. 1 seeded 15-1 Minnesota Vikings at the Metrodome in the 1998 NFC Championship. Before getting back to the Super Bowl in 2016, this was the greatest moment in Falcons franchise history. Unfortunately schtick-y dances don’t beat John Elway in a Super Bowl.
When safety Eugene Robinson just decided to do whatever he felt like in Miami, there went Atlanta’s chances at hoisting a Lombardi Trophy. They’d only go on to blow a 25-point lead in Super Bowl LI 18 years later. The Brotherhood Falcons didn’t have a dance. Hindsight tells us that it would have been the difference last February.