Not easy to rhyme Ivanovic
Choosing to chomp down on an opponent has earned Liverpool’s Luis Suarez a 10-match ban from English soccer authorities and some biting wit from others, including The Associated Press’ John Leicester who just wishes Suarez had picked a different victim than Chelsea’s Branislav Ivanovic.
“Because finding words that rhyme with the Serbian defender’s name is tricky,” Leicester writes.
“Spinach? Twitch? Stitch?
“Inventing suitably humorous chants to poke fun at the Liverpool striker is going to test football’s wittier fans. But if there was ever an absurd, ridiculous and laughable story that cried out for their creative and poetic talents, then Suarez biting Ivanovic’s arm in the Premier League on Sunday was it.
“My best effort so far - ‘He’s red, he’s white, he really likes to bite, Luis Suarez, Luis Suarez.’
“Too obvious.
“ ‘Red is his color, Dracula’s the name, with his sharp little fangs, he puts you off your game.’
Could be catchier.
“ ‘He got the itch, in the middle of the pitch, for a taste of Ivanovic
’ …
“Definitely not.
“Still, be thankful for small mercies. The Liverpool striker could have munched instead on Cesar Azpilicueta, Ivanovic’s partner in the Chelsea defense.
Shakespeare himself would have struggled to make a playful ditty with that name.”
This bites, too
Patrice Evra, who has feuded with Luis Suarez, got in his shot by pretending to bite into a fake dismembered arm during Manchester United’s title-winning celebrations Monday.
After Manchester United’s 3-0 victory over Aston Villa, Evra collected a joke arm when itwas thrown onto the pitch from the crowd at Old Trafford and gesturing to bite into it. He then posed for pictures with it.
Of course, he better hope that dig doesn’t come back to bite him.
Another foodie
Georgia linebacker Jarvis Jones is following in Robert Griffin III’s food steps.
Griffin earned NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year honors last year after allowing a statue of him, made of smokehouse barbecue chicken, to be sculpted for Subway by artist James Victor.
The same barbecue chicken Griffin preferred, along with 1,000 raisins, was used to sculpt Jones’ likeness, unveiled Tuesday in Manhattan, N.Y., and Jones hopes he’ll end up as rookie of the year, too.
“That’s definitely one of my goals,” Jones said. “That would be a great accomplishment to start off my career.”
Of course, if it doesn’t happen, Jones can at least be satisfied with knowing he has the better food dreadlocks.
“This was easier in a way because I had a clear idea of what to do,” said Victor, whose wife Marie came up with the idea of using raisins for the dreadlocks; Victor said he was not as pleased with how Griffin’s hair looked in the previous bust.
“I didn’t want to have too much of the same as we had with RG3. I think we did what we set out to do.”
Phoning it in
Kansas City Chiefs offensive tackle Geoff Schwartz doesn’t care much for the precedent set by Tiger Woods being assessed a two-stroke penalty during the Masters.
“Talked to my dad about the viewer calling in on Tiger,” Schwartz tweeted. “We both agreed it’s best viewers can’t call in holding penalties on me.”
Quote of the day
“I don’t think you need to be a rocket scientist to figure that out when you look at the minutes. Every system doesn’t fit every player.” Arkansas Wings AAU basketball Coach Ron Crawford, on former Arkansas forward Hunter Mickelson
Sports, Pages 18 on 04/26/2013