Written by Jerry Roche

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Like J. Paul Getty Jr., many of our celebrated athletic heroes apparently consider money a considerable burden. And thus are fools and their money soon parted. Former Browns running back Jamal Lewis is the latest in an extensive list of pro athletes and celebrities who have filed for bankruptcy.

Their one commonality? They have earned riches and wealth beyond the wildest dreams of mortal souls — and they’ve squandered it away as fast as drunken senators. (In the past, we might have written “drunken sailors,” but given the news of the day, “drunken senators” is much more relevant.)

Lewis — who helped the Baltimore Ravens win the Super Bowl in 2001 — has racked up more than $10 million in debts. By filing Chapter 11, he can keep most of what he's got (five homes, expensive cars, and a 50 percent ownership of Fort Rapids Indoor Waterpark in Columbus) while negotiating reduced and extended payments to creditors (including Bank of America, Benz and Chrysler).

Makes you wonder who wrote the bankruptcy laws: rich folk?

Money earned by other notable athletes like Michael Vick, Mike Tyson, Dorothy Hamill and the late Johnny Unitas hasn’t just burned holes in their pockets, it has totally conflagrated their entire bodies.

Vick, for instance, was once the highest-paid player in the NFL after signing a contract that paid him an average of $13 million per year over the course of a decade. By last fall, he’d spent $6.6 million of it and owed the IRS almost $5 million in taxes.

Joining Lewis and Vick on the list of NFL players who have decided to indulge themselves rather than establish trust funds for their loved ones are former All-Pro Lawrence Taylor and quarterbacks Unitas, Mark Brunell and Bernie Kosar. ("Money management" must not be on the Wonderlic for QBs.)

Some have gone the nose-candy route to dispense of those confounded Ben Franklins. Many like Lewis have pissed it away on mansions and expensive cars. Others like Kosar, in the quest to turn eight-figure legacies into nine- and ten-figure legacies, have simply made bad business investments. For instance, Hamill, the cute little skater who won the 1976 Olympic gold medal, sought to save the failing Ice Capades but couldn’t compete with Disney bucks (“Disney on Ice”).

Let’s not forget Tyson, the former boxer and famous appendage-muncher, who spent more than the almost $400 million he earned during his career. Which begs the question: How can you live beyond your means when your means amounts to eight or nine figures over a decade? Answer: just Google “Tyson mansion” to see photos of the now-abandoned 10,000-square-foot Southington, Ohio, residence that features five bedrooms, an indoor pool, a full outdoor basketball court and tiger cages on-site.

And then there are the pro basketball players. In 2008, the NBA Players’ Association claimed that 60 percent of pro basketball players go broke within five years of retirement. (That’s broke as in, “Buddy, can you spare a dime?” — despite the ever-increasing trend for broadcasting networks to hire former athletes who can barely pronounce their own names.) Notable: Kenny Anderson, Latrell Sprewell, Derrick Coleman, Scottie Pippen and Antoine Walker.

Other athletes who have filed for bankruptcy in the recent past include baseballers Jack Clark, Tony Gwynn and Lenny Dykstra, and trackster Marion Jones.

The list of bankrupt celebrities outside of the sporting realm is easily as extensive:

>> San Antonio Spur Tony Parker’s ex Eva Longoria, who found that she couldn’t just bat her eyelashes and make all her creditors melt

>> Rapper MC Hammer, who splurged his wealth on a lavish lifestyle that included a $12 million California mansion, enormous stables housing 19 thoroughbred racehorses, and a paid staff of 200

>> Actress Kim Basinger, who bought a Georgia town for $20 million

>> Octomom Nadya Suleman, who never failed to get pregnant but failed in her Chapter 7 bankruptcy plea

>> Actor Gary Busey, who owes more than $500,000 (a pittance by most celebrities’ standards)

>> Actress Lindsay Lohan, 25, whose most recent work includes “I Know Who Killed Me” and a bare-all but minor role in “Machete”

>> Singer Willie Nelson, who owed the gubmint $16.7 million in back taxes in 1990

>> “Blair Witch” executive producer Kevin J. Foxe (whose movie made $248 million)

>> Singers Toni Braxton, Meat Loaf, Cyndi Lauper, Marvin Gaye and Wayne Newton

As Busey’s representative notes, bankruptcy "allows stupid people to jettison the litter of past unfortunate choices, associations, circumstances and events.”

If it were only that easy for the rest of us.