From an interview of Steve Nash of the NBA's Phoenix Suns in the New York Times:
Q. Rick Welts, the Suns’ chief executive, recently announced that he was gay. How do you think he’ll be received by the players?
A. I don’t think the players on our team care. Not a lot of guys on the team have a lot of contact with Rick, including myself. Obviously, I have a ton of respect for him and what he does for the organization. I think he’s great at what he does.
Q. Would the situation be different, maybe tougher, if a general manager or basketball-side executive came out?
A. In some ways, it would have been a different story because it would have been more high profile. A general manager can’t hide, really. Obviously, there would have been a whole other segment of questioning. There would be a lot of, ‘Really?’ And then a short period later, everyone’s like, ‘Who cares?’ and moves on.
Q. Is the N.B.A. ready for an openly gay player?
A. If a player in the locker room came out, it would come and go quickly, too. I really don’t think it’s a big issue anymore. I think it would be surprisingly accepted, and a shorter shelf life than maybe we would imagine. I think the time has come when it should happen soon. I think it will be something that won’t take on this life of its own. It won’t be the O. J. trial.
A column in the Arizona Republic looks at the same interview:
While former NBA player John Amaechi did not publicly say that he was gay while he was active in the league, he came out in 2007 when he released his book "Man in the Middle." It is evident in the book that some of his Utah Jazz teammates knew of his lifestyle or suspected.
In the book, Amaechi describes a moment at the arena when he was coming through the tunnel with teammate and close friend Greg Ostertag.
"Ya gay, dude?" Amaechi wrote that Ostertag asked him. He answered, "Greg, you have nothing to worry about." And Amaechi added that "It was clear Greg couldn't have cared less."
He also wrote of an invitation he received from teammate Andrei Kirilenko to a New Year's Eve party in which Kirilenko told Amaechi he should bring "your partner, if you have one; someone special to you. Who it is makes no difference to me."
While a few active and retired NBA players - most notably Tim Hardaway - initially bashed Amaechi when he made the announcement, most said they didn't much care.
Hill, who had been a teammate of Amaechi's in Orlando, was among those who spoke out in support of him.
And last in our round-up, Outsports has done their own round-up, HERE, which includes this one we missed from Red Eye Chicago (just a sample, read it in full HERE):
I hope Derrick Rose is gay.
Wait, that sounded weird. Let me qualify that: I wish Derrick Rose were a homosexual. I would enjoy it if he preferred to have sex with men.
When Phoenix Suns president Rick Welts told The New York Times last week that he is gay, it was met with a collective shrug by most. However, his reluctance to out himself even in 2011 is a powerful reminder that professional sports remains one of the last and strongest bastions of homophobia in American culture. Hell, with the end of "don't ask, don't tell," the military may become a more progressive, LGBT-friendly institution than the MLB, NFL, NBA or NHL.
Logic tells us there are many gay players competing in all four of these leagues, yet they remain in the closet, likely for myriad reasons. Yet this is 2011, and it's time someone did it. It's time a high-profile professional athlete revealed himself to be gay because as soon as he did—and he didn't lose endorsement deals and the world didn't erupt in a fury of orgiastic destruction—it would allow other players to take the leap. And before you knew it fans in the Deep South could find themselves cheering for a pitcher with a lethal fastball who also happened to be gay.
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