SEVE OR SEVVY

For over a decade now The Sun has persisted in calling Severiano Ballesteros Sevvy, rather than Seve. This despite entreaties from Seve himself via his agent, and evidence everywhere else (see pictures) that Sevvy is, in fact, Seve. The Sun, being The Sun, has blissfully ignored them.
I have my own theory about how this came about.
Most tabloids, given the restraint of word counts in headlines ruthlessly abbreviate the names of sportsmen and women. Sometimes to ludicrous extents. The best example I can think of is the former Glasgow Rangers captain Lorenzo Amoruso who (before he left the city suffering a case of mistaken identity) found himself titled in The Scottish Sun as "Amoro", "Loro", "Amo" and even, when things got really tight "Am". If he had hung around long enough he would have found himself up there in lights as "A".
But sometimes nicknames can be too short and my belief is that in the case of The Sun on the first occasion the deeds of the young Ballesteros required a headline it ran across a single column with a count of five. Seve was a character shy so he became Sevvy and has been, in The Sun at least, ever since. Now you know.