SAN FRANCISCO--These days, when celebratory dances have become an art form, the fun doesn’t usually start until after someone scores a touchdown. Players like Terrell Owens and Joe Horn, as well as several defensive backs, have made their signature end zone moves as much a part of the game as scoring itself. There’s also a little good natured competition between the star players about which touchdown dance is the gayest.

“With all due respect to those other guys,” said Joe Horn of the New Orleans Saints. “I don’t think there’s anyone gayer than me. Have you seen my new move? No self respecting man would ever do something like that. It was pretty bold to do something that gay on the gridiron. But hey, I’m a bad motherfucker”

In his touchdown dance, Horn begins by turning to face the crowd in the back of the end zone. Then, with the football in his right hand, he holds his arms outstretched to the sides, squats down and slowly rotates his pelvis like an exotic dancer. It’s hard to argue with Horn’s statement about the gayness of his dance, and even some experts have complimented him on his abilities.

Michael Flatley, the so called “Lord of the Dance” who has made a career of prancing around in tights, says that Horn's dance is pretty good, but leaves a little to be desired.

“Horn has nice form,” said Flatley. “His moves, his style, his whole attitude is pretty feminine. He looks gay alright, but he hasn’t really crossed the line into flaming.”

Members of the Miami Dolphins secondary have created their own “team celebration” that they feel sets a new standard of gayness for the entire league. The team celebration is more effective , they say, because it allows the players to interact with each other like a group of intoxicated females in a nightclub.

“Ever go to a nightclub and see the way bitches like to grind with each other when they get really drunk?” asked Patrick Surtain. “That’s us. We get in a little circle, face each other, grab our crotches and start going at it. Really, we stop just short of blowing each other. Take that Joe Horn.”

“That’s a really interesting dance,” says Flatley. “That’s the way you would expect a guy to dance with a girl in a nightclub- really close, with those undulating hips. Quite gay. At one point, I really thought they were about to kiss. I actually got a little uncomfortable, and I wear tights for a living.”

The history of the end zone dance goes back close to twenty years. For decades, any kind of excessive celebration was considered unsportsmanlike, and players kept their enthusiasm to a minimum. Certainly no one would be caught dancing in the end zone in the days of Dick Butkus and Deacon Jones.

“If someone busted into a dance while I was playing," says Butkus, former Bears linebacker. “We would’ve pummeled him, and the referees wouldn’t have tried to stop us either.”

That all changed in the '80s with Billy “White shoes” Johnson. The Houston Oilers wide receiver began doing a garish dance in the end zone after every touchdown catch. At first, fellow players were outraged, but eventually the trend caught on.

“I was just having some innocent fun,” says Johnson. “I didn’t realize it would turn into some big goddamn homo-fest.”

Unfortunately for Johnson, it has. But the days of Billy Johnson being the lone maverick player to dance in the end zone are long gone, and according to one Terrell Owens, there’s a new sheriff in town.

“Billy was a trail blazer for sure,” says Owens. “But with all due respect, his touchdown dance wasn’t even that gay. It was just stupid”

Owens has created quite a stir the past few years with his gaudy, ostentatious dance routines. His carefully planned and choreographed antics are the talk of the league. Some view them as harmless fun, some as shameless self promotion, but almost everyone agrees that the touchdown celebrations are the gayest in the league.

“You don’t get much gayer than Terrell Owens,” admitted Flatley. “That guy’s good. To see him gaily prancing around in the end zone like tinkerbell is to witness a true sissy at work. That guy makes Harvey Firestein look like Clint Eastwood. And to do that on a football field, a place of unfettered macho aggression, is pretty ballsy.”

Says sports commentator Bob Costas: “Terrell Owens and these other players are challenging the notion that all football players are tough, masculine, hard nosed warriors. They’re saying ‘Hey America, football players can be sissies, too. Not only that, we’re proud of it.’

One of Owens’ most notorious dances came last year in a game against Green Bay. After he reached the end zone, he ran up to one off the cheerleaders, grabbed her pom-poms, and hopped up and down while waving them like a school girl.

“No question about it, I am the gayest” said a boastful Owens afterward. “Who’s gayer than me? All you haters out there can just clear the muthafuckin lane, cuz there aint nobody in this league who can bring it like TO when it comes to faggy dances.”

He went on to say that his next new dance move will break new ground and set an entirely new standard for wimpy, sissy, girlie prancing. According to sources close to Owens, nobody has seen the new dance, but it will somehow involve a tutu, a baton, and an curly blonde wig.