Taunting dos and don'ts for Monday Night from ESPN

DO be creative
A thing of beauty lasts forever. Someone famous wrote that.


Likewise, a clever taunt lasts for an entire news cycle. Sometimes, even longer. And in the 24/7 era of ESPN, ESPN2 and ESPNews, that's no small feat. In a sense, taunts are like breast implants -- the whole point is to get noticed. Originality spawns headlines.


Recall former Florida coach Steve Spurrier's now-famous dig at arch rival Tennessee, a reference to the Vols playing in the second-tier Citrus Bowl? "You can't spell Citrus without U-T," he said. Did Spurrier get in Tennessee's collective head? You bet.


When Florida played in the Citrus Bowl a few years later, Vols fans welcomed Spurrier with an airplane banner that flew over the stadium. Even though the Gators were playing Michigan State.


Remember: When Richard Williams offered in "Venus Envy" to have a surgeon friend from Compton sew longer legs on diminutive Swiss tennis star Martina Hingis, he wasn't just psyching out his daughters' primary competition at the time. He was taking a (pot)shot at immortality.



Note: If you happen to be Jeremy Shockey -- or fascinate the New York City media nexus as much as Jeremy Shockey does -- disregard the above. Instead, revel in the fact that you can call someone a "homo" and still make the nightly news, even though no one past third grade still uses that word.




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