I wasn't going to write about Washington Wizards basketball star Gilbert Arenas, but he's behaved so stupidly I kind of have to.
I mean, here's a guy with a contract worth $111. million. That's right, $111. million. And he's dumb enough to maybe throw it all away? Yes...suspended indefinitely without pay for now, maybe out of the game for good. What did he do? He brought a gun--well, no, four guns--to work, laid them out for a teammate he'd been arguing with over gambling debt with a note that said, "Pick one." The teammate promptly produced a gun of his own and, some accounts say, chambered a round. Arenas also pointed his finger at photographers as if it were a gun, cocked it and pretended to shoot them.
Sounds like school kids on the playground, right? But an alleged grownup, a multi-millionaire? Give me a bleeping break!
Arenas, I read somewhere, has tattoos on his body of inspirational figures including Malcolm X and Nelson Mandela. Important leaders. Wise men. Gun carriers? Nah, though Malcolm of course was murdered. Maybe Arenas should have skipped practice one day and read a little about them. They wanted to change the world, not shoot it.
It's inevitable, I suppose, that professional athletes are overpaid, idolized, and all that. Many of them, Michael Jordan, Mohammed Ali, do just fine with it all. Arenas, on the other hand, for now can't do the one thing he's good at, the one thing we can admire about him - play basketball. Seems like someone who shouldn't be walking around without a keeper.
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