Career Path Of Entourage Members Grows More Demanding
Hamilton Nolan · 04/11/08 10:10AMGreedy professional athletes these days are making it harder and harder for their layabout friends to sponge money off them and land them in jail. TREND ALERT. It seems that athletic superstars and journeymen alike are getting their entourages more organized, incorporating them into real businesses and paying their hangers-on set salaries rather than just giving them unchecked credit cards and free cars [WSJ]. And then there's the NFL cornerback who pays his helpers on a per-task basis, like when "he gave one of his freelancers $5 to fetch him a Snickers bar." So it's still an evolving sphere of economics. One of the players cited is Mike Bibby, a slightly above-average NBA point guard who has organized his friends into "Team Dime" (he's #10!). That's nice and everything, but probably not worth the permanent tattoos, which send the lifelong message: "I was a member of an entourage for a slightly above-average NBA player":