That’s the message every professional athlete should get pounded into them again and again and again.

They wake up – their alarm clock should chime: “DON’T BE A DICK!”

They roll over to kiss the wife or girlfriend or whatever, and they’ll hear, “Morning honey. Remember, don’t be a dick today.”

When one of their umpteen kids runs into the bedroom and jumps up on the bed they should always say, “Are you awake Daddy? And oh ya, don’t be a dick.”

It’s simple really. Just like losing virginity, once an athlete becomes a dick, he can never go back. Just ask, well, any of the myriad dicks you know.

The best cyclist in the world right now is Columbia’s Alberto Contador and he’s a HUGE dick. The winner of last year’s Tour De France is head and shoulders above everyone else when it comes to climbing and time trialling. On Monday he was sitting second, a few seconds behind Luxembourg’s Andy Schleck. On a high mountain stage in the Pyrenees, Schleck’s chain slipped off his bike and got caught in the axel, and he had to wait 30 seconds or so for the team car to get him a new one.

In the sport of cycling, the rule of the road is uncomplicated: mechanical breakdowns or minor spills during a stage shouldn’t be taken advantage of, yet that’s just what Contador did. Immediately attacking, he bounded up the mountain as soon as Schleck was off, eventually taking out all 38-second advantage, and putting an eight-second gap for the overall lead.

When he stood up on the podium to accept the yellow jersey as the new leader of the Tour, he was booed. All the fans at the finish saw what happened on the course and they all knew what Contador had just done, well, just wasn’t done.

Immediately after the stage, he was hustled away by his handlers and shortly there afterwards he released a video apologizing to Schleck and to cycling fans in general, insisting he didn’t know his opponent had a mechanical breakdown.

Which was another dick move? Of course, he knew – he was on the radio with his team car, who were watching the broadcast of the race in real time.

Rule No. 2: When trying to prove you’re not a dick, don’t lie about it.

Today, as a result, the most gifted rider in the world and the guy who should be celebrated as the worthy successor to Lance Armstrong is now about as popular as a drug cheat in a sport that hates drug cheats.

Nice job.

Of course, he’s not alone.

He’s got a buddy in LeBron James, the guy who flushed all his goodwill down the crapper with the stupidest PR move in sports history, his “The Decision” special on ESPN a couple of weeks back. Ever since, the ripping and tearing of the guy who wants to be known as “King James” has been constant and coming from everywhere, except South Florida.

In Cleveland, his jerseys are still being burned in effigy and a crowd of a couple of thousand showed up to watch the removal of his 10-story mural from a downtown building. Cavaliers owner Dan Gilbert issued a statement that was so inflammatory the league fined him $100k – and he refused to take any of it back.

Fans around the world are pissed. Michael Jordan even came out critical of his decision insisting he would never have joined up with two superstars when he was playing (ya right!).

James was even booed at a wedding. The Nuggets Carmelo Anthony and someone named LaLa Vazquez hooked up last weekend in New York, and wherever LeBron was, he was hearing it from whoever was in shouting range – something he’d better get used to.

Ten million people watched his “decision” live and if he had it to do all over, no doubt would have done it differently, say like in a cone of silence or in a cave or something.

Now he’s reaping the whirlwind wondering how to come out from the other side.

But really, he can’t.

Just ask the biggest dick there is out there right now, Tiger Woods. His perfect life was blown to bits when the National Enquirer followed him to Australia last fall and published the pictures that led to the car crash that caused his SUV’s windows to be smashed with a golf club that resulted in him being up to $750-million lighter in the wallet.

Now his main revenue stream is deader than his winning streak. Sponsors are not coming back yet, and they won’t until he starts winning. Yet what was once a certainty every third tournament he played is now looking unlikely anytime soon. At the British Open the role of Tiger Woods was played by someone named Louis Oosthuizen, who lapped the field like Woods did the two last time the tournament was played at St. Andrews.

Woods finished hours before the Claret Jug was raised, insisting on TV that he was “close.”

Maybe he is, but he’s not close to shedding the label that’s causing him the most grief. That of being a dick to his wife and kids and everyone who ever trusted him. His good guy image is gone and gone for good.

The thing is, in sports, there have always been dicks. It’s been chock full of them forever in fact, and now, just like then, there’s a dirty little dick secret:

It doesn’t really matter to anyone other than the dick himself.

Over the years billions of megabits have been sent and whole forests have been felled writing about how major sports figures have crashed from grace.

And over those same years its been proven we… just… don’t… care.

Once Albert, LeBron and Tiger embrace their inner dickdom, they’ll be fine and so will we.

But of course, it’s WAY easier not to be a dick.

At least that’s what I’ve been told.

Cheers – Gavin McDougald – AKA Couch