Back in 2008 in light of some scandals that went on, I wrote the 10 Commandments for the Cheating Athlete. This is before Twitter, before you could screenshot your texts, before Basketball Wives, before Facebook was worth 192384384 Billion dollars. This was back when MYSPACE is where people went to hook up online.
In light of the recent Royce Reed & Dezmon Briscoe fiasco it was time to update. Some Commandments will be relevant until the end of time, but the rest have been updated.
I- IF THOU SHALL WIFE HER, THOU BETTER MAKE SURE SHE DOESN’T CARE IF YOU CHEAT.
As an athlete I can definitely understand why you would want to get married. You want to have some kids (not out of wedlock). You want someone you can confide in. You want someone you can be yourself around. You want someone who loves you for who you are and not what you are. Plus on top of that, it doesn’t hurt to have a nice wholesome image for potential advertisers. As they say, getting married helps the “Q” rating.
But whomever you decide to marry, you better be sure she can handle the fact you are going to have many “side” women. Also, she better be able to handle the fact that women all over the country will be coming at you 24/7 365 days a year. Some women have the fantasy that if they marry an athlete he will be faithful. That is a recipe for disaster. So you may have to sit your lady down and explain to her that she is the main girl. Is that enough to make her happy? If not, you’re going to have a lot of issues.
You have to make sure she understands, you won’t embarrass her, but you have needs and you plan on fulfilling them.
II- THOU SHALL ALWAYS HAVE A PRENUP.
In the immortal of Kanye West: “WE WANT PRENUP”.
This should be the simplest rule of all. You make millions of dollars while she works part time of at the Cheesecake Factory. That doesn’t add up to 50/50. Even if you’re following these commandments, there is still a good shot that your wife will leave you (see: Kobe Bryant). So you need to protect yourself legally. If she doesn’t want to sign the prenup, that should be your first clue that she might not be the one you want to marry. Be fair in the prenup. Offer enough money for her to be comfortable and more importantly to keep her mouth shut after the divorce.
III- THOU SHALL NOT CARE IF WIFEY CHEATS ON YOU.
I like to call this the Shaq rule. Shaq follows the cheating code to a tee. However, the one part that has cost him is, when he found out his wife was cheating on him, he flipped out and filed for divorce not realizing that all the dirt he has done would come to light.
If you are going to have different women in all 50 states and be gone half the time don’t be naïve enough to think your wife won’t sleep with the pool boy, after sitting at home alone in a huge house taking care of a couple of kids and not getting any sex. Don’t be naïve and think your wife won’t go to a club and sleep with a random guy who looks like Usher and maybe do it in the club. Don’t be naïve if a “George” is whispering sweet nothings in your wife’s ear, talking about how she deserves better and ends up playing “Bed Gammon” with her. She doesn’t want a divorce, but she does want attention so don’t overreact when it happens if you want to keep the majority of your savings account.
IV- THOU SHALL ALWAYS REMEMBER IT IS CHEAPER TO KEEP HER.
Simply put, who would you rather have deciding where your funds go: you or a judge? Much better to pay now than later. So if your wife sees you on TMZ.com with four strippers in a hot tube popping bottles it is better to just give her the American Express card than to have her visit the lawyer’s office the next day. Take the hit and move on.
V- THOU SHALL REMEMBER THAT SOCIAL MEDIA IS THE DEVIL!!!
You know why the Devil is so powerful? Because he makes things easy for you without telling what the consequences are. Same thing with social media the women are readily available, but you can’t tell how someone will react to being the sidepiece or jumpoff via a DM.
Plus, one of the first places your significant other is going to check is your Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and anything else where the Thirst is readily available.
Use your social media spaces for business, promotion and connect with your friends, not a brothel. If you do eventually you will slip up, isn’t that right Ray Allen?
Ray Allen is married and that wasn’t to his wife (he deleted his Twitter soon thereafter never to return).
VI- THOU SHALL NEVER CHEAT WITH AN OBSESSED FAN.
There’s a very fine line between a typical groupie and an obsessed fan. If you are going to cheat, you want to cheat with a woman whose mind is based in reality. This is why it is very important to be up front about what it is going down. Crazy women don’t think rationally and will show up at your front door with a thong and no shirt on telling your wife this is what you like. Crazy women will show up at the game with a sign saying:
“LAST NIGHT WAS THE BEST 2 MINUTES OF MY LIFE”
So when you are cheating with a woman make sure she has the capacity to just walk away. No harm, no foul.
VII- THOU SHALL REMEMBER CONDOMS COST $8 A BOX AS OPPOSED TO 25% OF YOUR GROSS INCOME GOING TO CHILD SUPPORT.
Also known as the “Antonie Cromartie/Terrell Owens/Almost Every Athlete with More than 4 Kids Rule.” I had a girlfriend once whose main goal in our relationship was to get pregnant. The reason being, she knew I would always support the child. At that point in my life, I was making $12 an hour in a call center. Now imagine, if I were making 12 million dollars a year, how many women would give their right arm to have a little Robert Littal Jr. running around so they can sit on their ass and watch Oprah and buy Coach bags on my dime.
I understand athletes aren’t the brightest people in the world and can’t always understand that $8 is a lot less than $8000 a month. I am sure there are women who love athletes for their “personalities” and would never dare to get pregnant on purpose. However, I am more sure there are many women who see athletes as a free American Express card for life.
VIII- THOU SHALL REMEMBER THEY ARE STRIPPERS AND PROSTITUTES FOR A REASON.
Strippers and prostitutes are hustlers by trade. That is what they do. They are pimping their bodies out for profit. Their profession is shady and, in some regards, very dangerous. They are the low rung on the totem pole, so to speak.
So when you mix that with a high profile athlete, you have a recipe for disaster. Be it Pacman errrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr Adam Jones or Eugene Robinson, it just doesn’t seem to work out that well. If you are going to “make it rain,” it is best to do it in the comfort of your own home not in a seedy joint where your success only puts a “X” on your chest.
IX- THOU SHALL CARFAX YOUR JUMPOFF.
Stiletto Jill often says Athletes are the biggest groupies. That makes them idiots, because they don’t read the CARFAX on the women they are dealing with.
You would think if a woman has been on Mediatakeout 7 times for exposing rappers and athletes, that you might be aware she might expose you to.
If you knew someone was a snitch, why would you tell them a secret?
But time and time again athletes deal with women who has known issues, who have exposed athletes before, who have kids by other athletes, who Tweet all their information for everyone to see, who are attention whores and still……………
Think they won’t do it to them.
There is no warranty on attention whoring. Do you research, get a CARFAX and understand just because the woman has a nice frame, doesn’t mean she doesn’t have a blown head gasket.
X- THOU SHALL DELETE, DELETE, DELETE..NEVER LEAVE PAPER TRAIL & USE SOME COMMON SENSE
I watch a lot Discovery ID and they have a show called “I Almost Got Away With It”. The premise of the show is simple criminals (some quite brilliant) escape from the law and are on the run.
You would think they would get caught because of some great detective work by the police, but you would be wrong.
Almost every single time the criminal gets caught because they relax and leave one single piece evidence that gets them thrown back in jail.
Texting, DMs, Voicemails, emails, Sexting and etc are a way of life. It is unreasonable to tell you not to engage in some of that, but be smart.
Lock your phone, if you are taking naked pics cut your head off, speak in code, delete your emails, delete your texts, delete your DMs, Get confidentiality agreements signed, don’t contact your mistress from your WORK PHONE (yes I am talking to you Bobby Petrino), don’t tell your baby mama you want to “bend her over” to get on her good side (yes I am talking to Dezmon Briscoe), don’t do this…………
Getting busted sometimes is unavoidable, but if you have to sit in jail it might being comforting to know you didn’t do it to yourself.
In the end your best defense is common sense.