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Pros had better stop arms race

Atheletes who are so rich and famous that they feel the need to protect them selves can afford to hire security.

No need to imitate Plaxico Burress, who jammed a handgun down his pants at a nightclub before shooting himself, or Washington Wizards star Gilbert Arenas, who apparently kept his piece handy for brandishing at a teammate in a locker room over a gambling debt.

You can pick your friends, not your teammates. But in light of Burress’ prison sentence and ruined career, what kind of an idiot is Arenas, who according to Post sports columnist Peter Vecsey’s sources, pulled a gun on Wizards teammate Javaris Crittenton?

If that wasn’t bad enough, Crittenton then pulled a piece of his own.

The dopey duo are part of a growing number of athletes packing heat. Estimates are that more than 50 percent of NFL players own guns — for protection, they say.

Former Giants footballer Will Allen was assaulted, doused with gasoline and robbed by an assailant at his house in 2001. Former NFL receiver Yancey Thigpen and his wife were tied up and robbed while his young child was locked in a closet at his home.

Out of such fears, athletes arm themselves, ignoring the good sense of Paul Pierce, the Celtics star who was the victim of a multiple stabbing at a Boston nightclub — but still chooses to take a security person with him, rather than his licensed handgun.

A limo driver is dead and the fate of ex-NBA star Jayson Williams still is in legal limbo over a horrific, accidental firing at Williams’ New Jersey mansion eight years ago. And yet athletes such as Allen Iverson, Sebastian Telfair and Delonte West still have been arrested on gun charges out of exaggerated needs to arm themselves.

Pro sports leagues, which bar athletes from bringing guns to the stadiums and arenas — but say they can’t keep them from owning licensed weapons — really should think about barring handgun ownership in standard players contracts.

Sure, it’s a free country, with the right to bear arms. But if a team can put clauses in contracts barring their investments from skiing or hang gliding, players should also lose millions and playing privileges for handgun ownership.

Ultimately, however, the athletes themselves must be educated to understand the risks of firearms.

“I don’t know what you need a gun for in the NBA,” former Utah Jazz star Karl Malone, himself a hunter and spokesman for the National Rifle Association, has said. “Who have you pissed off that you need a gun?

“I think it’s just a smoke screen, just an easy reason to say you want a gun. Everybody sticks their chest out now when they have a firearm on them.”

jay.greenberg@nypost.com