King Kaufman's Sports Daily

Baby steps toward acceptance: A survey says 3 of 4 big leaguers would have "no problem" with a gay teammate. Plus: Could Dusty Baker's "game a week" theory really work?

July 13, 2004 | Whenever the subject of gay professional team athletes comes up, there are always plenty of people around to let us know that such a thing just isn't going to be accepted in the locker room. We're a long way away from having an active player who's out as gay, those in the know tell us.

Did you catch that survey of major league players the Tribune newspapers just conducted? Newsday reported Sunday that three out of four say they wouldn't be bothered by having a gay teammate.

The chain got answers from about two-thirds of current players on a list of 10 questions on various topics, including "Who's the best player in the game?" (Barry Bonds was the consensus) "How big a problem is competitive imbalance?" (not a problem) and "Would it bother you to have a gay teammate?"

On the gay question, 476 players answered, and 353 of them -- 74.2 percent -- said having a gay teammate wouldn't bother them. Seventy-three players, 15.3 percent, said it would bother them, and 50 players, 10.5 percent, had no comment. I'm pretty comfortable translating that "no comment" as "Yes, I'd have a problem," aren't you? That's still three out of four having no problem.

"I'm sure I've had one at some point," shrugged veteran first baseman Robin Ventura of the Dodgers.

None of this is to suggest that life will be beer and skittles for that first gay big leaguer, or even those first few. It was only last week when an Associated Press story on gays in sports quoted superstar Braves reliever John Smoltz saying about gay marriage, "What's next? Marrying an animal?" His teammate, catcher Eddie Perez, was quoted saying, "It would be hard to play with someone all year and then find out they're gay."

Both players used the Braves P.R. department to say the quotes attributed to them didn't accurately reflect their views on the subject, but what got missed in the mini-controversy that followed those statements was that they also said they'd just deal with it if a teammate came out.

"Sooner of later, someone is going to do it," Smoltz said. "I wouldn't have a problem with it -- unless it compromised the team."

"If I knew a guy was gay," Perez said, "then I could work it out. I could be prepared. I could hide when I'm getting disrobed."

Not exactly open-armed acceptance, but the old chant doesn't go, "We're here, we're queer, be thrilled about it." The last part is, "Get used to it." Those 74 percent said no to the question "Would you be bothered?" They didn't say yes to "Would you support, encourage and be a champion of?" And having one out of four colleagues "bothered" by your existence doesn't make it easy to go to work.

But it doesn't make it impossible either.

Next page: But Dusty Baker said "a game a week" before and went to the Series! A non-correction