Bad choices catch up with star athletes

You are a professional athlete. You are rich and famous and powerful. Your mistakes are excused, if you are good enough. Your messes are for someone else to clean up.

That is the lesson sent when you are young. Talent makes right. Why should you not believe that as a man? Having to be wise, to be careful … those boring necessities are for the chumps of the world. The un-worshiped and un-idolized.

You are too big a star to have to be smart.

Until one day …

Twenty-three months. This is what the judge said to Michael Vick on Monday. Nearly two years of a young life to be spent in prison, another universe from the cheering Georgia Dome.

Now Vick knows the exact and official price for making lousy decisions, and then making even more. To behave badly, and then lie about it – isn’t that a cornerstone of not getting the message?

Maybe he will, now that he knows how far heroes can fall.

You are not a bad person. Just another who fell into the trap. You believe you are immune, above it all, able to ignore what you wish to with a wave of your name.

Until one day …

His plea was not guilty to the charge that he lied to a grand jury and obstructed justice. His bail was $500,000. Then Barry Bonds left the courtroom. But he will be back one day. The charges are not going away.

Last Friday might never have happened had Bonds been more forthcoming, and had he decided that his famous ability for aloof distance and disdain for the answered question would not serve him well in this case. A contrite, consistent, conversational Bonds might have made everything so different.

Reality is sometimes not being in control, not being able to make the rules. But you are an icon. Changing attitude and conduct is for those who sit on the bench.

Until one day …

According to police reports, the shooting started about 3:40 a.m. That’s when an unknown assailant fired an assault rifle at Jamaal Tinsley, the point guard for the Indiana Pacers, in a confrontation that began outside a bar.

After the first shots, two vehicles raced away on the streets of downtown Indianapolis. Two more vehicles were in pursuit, with Tinsley’s brother returning fire.

No, this is not HBO. This is the NBA.

If the words “Tinsley” and “police report” seem to go together like bacon and eggs, it might be because this was his third incident with similar trimmings – late night mayhem in the general vicinity of a bar – in barely more than a year. He is due in court next month on a charge of felony intimidation and a bouquet of misdemeanors stemming from a fight last February.

Can anyone offer any possible reasons why there were 7,000 empty seats at the last Pacers’ home game?

There is more than one way to kill a franchise. But flying lead qualifies.

In a state that loves basketball like it loves Christmas, the Pacers’ attendance has done a swan dive – from an average of 18,345 in 2000 to 15,360 last season to 12,517 this one.

One reason is universal. The Pacers don’t win as much. Another is Reggie Miller doesn’t bury 3-pointers in Spike Lee’s face any more.

But another is a disconnect from the public; a disturbing pattern of off-court issues that shows little sign of abatement, when shots are fired on the main streets of town.

They have never fully recovered from the brawl in Auburn Hills, where Ron Artest led an invasion of the stands at the Palace. That was three years ago. Time can heal a lot, but it must be given a chance, with no relapses, and Indiana has had several.

Tinsley is having a fine season on the court. His game has developed. Apparently, his judgment has not.

He was not the fool who pulled the trigger on the assault rifle Saturday night.

But he was out at 3:30 a.m., in a questionable place, with questionable associations. There are ways to avoid trouble. This seems a textbook case of not having learned a thing.

So a Pacers’ franchise wilts, with a blight of bad judgment. So do Michael Vick’s Atlanta Falcons. Bonds helped turn a joyous new home run record into a contentious debate.

But you are a star and what you understand are big headlines and bigger paychecks. Your skills got you those, not your prudence. Nobody cares if you make bad choices.

Until one day they do.