The Ravens closed out their victory over the Colts in their Wild Card game with a kneeldown and one last home-field rendition of Ray Lewis’ “squirrel” dance.
It came at the end of a day devoted to Lewis, who announced he’d be retiring after the season last week to set up an emotional final game at M&T Bank Stadium. There were video tributes, a visit from NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and a pregame version of the dance that was clearly emotional for all involved. Then the Ravens put Lewis on the field with the victory formation to set up his final dance and that didn’t sit right with Colts wide receiver Reggie Wayne.
“I saw it as disrespectful,” Wayne said, via Jake Query of WNDE. “They’d already had a tribute every quarter.”
Impressions of how disrespectful the dance was will certainly differ, but there’s doubt that it was a tough day for Wayne and the Colts. They were beaten rather handily by the Ravens while playing what amounted to a supporting role in a celebration of Lewis’ career with the Ravens. The final dance was an exclamation point on that and, to Wayne, a punctuation mark too far.