Take this job and shove it.

Hardly a day goes by these days without someone breaking a contract to take another job.

I don’t get it.

Why offer a contract — make a big deal out of it, including photo opps for the TV and print guys, smiling all the while — when the guy you want on your team will more than likely jump ship after a couple of years?

“What happened to the 5-year contract we signed?”

It’s just a piece of paper.

Coaches in professional sports are great at this gig.

That bum of a football coach in Atlanta couldn’t even wait until the end of the Falcon’s miserable season before he skipped town.

Major League baseball players are jumping ship all the time.

The ink on contractual agreements isn’t dry and these clowns want out.

Loyalty is a thing of the past. It’s a joke.

Oh, but it gets better.

You gotta love the guys who get fired and are still paid big bucks.

North Dakota is great at this: the state will fire a college president or an agency’s chief executive officer and offer a severance package at the same time.

“We hope this will get you through the next couple of months. If a couple hundred thou isn’t enough, we’ll tack on a little more.”

The guy grabs the check and runs to catch the next plane leaving for the Gulf Coast off Mexico.

A college athletic director brushes off coaches, does his own thing for a couple of years, fools a ton of people, insults anyone who disagrees with him, yet is insulted when his job performance is questioned.

Matters little, when the dust settles, the college offers a get-out-of-town check worth a hundred thousand-plus.

Sure, your medical benefits are good for another year or two. Don’t worry, be happy.

I want that job.

Hell, I can cheer from the sidelines, hire a couple of coaches on the recommendation of others, claim it can’t be dumped on my lap when they lose, and push paperwork, complete with inflated attendance and revenue figures, through the system until someone blows the whistle.

“The guy’s a fraud.”

I, of course, will demand an administrative leave of absence, cry foul and plead for understanding, if not that then mercy, demand that my family not be drawn into the mudslinging, and lay low for a couple of months.

“You can reach me in the Caribbean islands, I’m recuperating. The stress is too much. By the way, how’s our football team doing?”

When he returns home, the new is not good.

“Fired? You’re firing me? After all I’ve done for this school? Pay me a couple hundred grand and I’m outta here.”

Actually, I think I’d make a better CEO or college president than I would a football coach or Major League Baseball manager.

Semi-slender, graying and hardly tall. Plus, I can slap hands with the best of ‘em.

What more do major colleges want these days?

In return, my agent would demand a new home, preferably off campus, and a multimillion dollar, long-term contract, complete with bonuses for a record number of TV interviews.

Sign me up, bucko.

You have to be mean-looking to be a football coach. Scars I have and I can stare down anyone, but when confronted I wilt.

Plus, you should look and sound like you’re suffering through a hangover whenever interviewed by the football beat writers. I can easily resurrect that look. But I’m still not menacing enough.

I am, however, an insufferable bore, which qualifies me for most coaching positions, high school being the exception, you understand.

While I may be convinced I could be a CEO, college president, athletic director or coach, I remain a flunky in the newspaper industry, where the fine print doesn’t get you millions, only more duties.

The celebrity status of having your own byline quickly dissolves when all the duties of a weekly newspaper editor are factored into the working equation.

I should have been a coach.

Floris, my mother, always wanted me to be a piano player in a bordello.