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| Michael Sam and Jason Collins in limbo after gay announcements | Michael Sam and Jason Collins in limbo after gay announcements |
| (7 months later) | |
| Maybe we should just admit to ourselves that we’re all still waiting for someone a bit more famous. | Maybe we should just admit to ourselves that we’re all still waiting for someone a bit more famous. |
| On Sunday, University of Missouri defensive end and NFL hopeful Michael Sam announced that he was gay. While this was something that those around him have known for a while, he made it public for a variety of reasons, most notably not wanting it to be a distraction in the months ahead as he looks for his first NFL job. If drafted, Sam would become the first openly gay active player in the NFL. | On Sunday, University of Missouri defensive end and NFL hopeful Michael Sam announced that he was gay. While this was something that those around him have known for a while, he made it public for a variety of reasons, most notably not wanting it to be a distraction in the months ahead as he looks for his first NFL job. If drafted, Sam would become the first openly gay active player in the NFL. |
| This could potentially be a big story, but it feels uncomfortably close to the still ongoing story of Jason Collins. Last April, veteran NBA big man Jason Collins, most recently of the Washington Wizards, came out as gay in a landmark feature for Sports Illustrated. While it was rightfully hailed as the first step towards a sports world where LGBT individuals would feel no need to hide their identities, the story seems much less notable now that after nearly a year, Collins still finds himself without a team. You can’t really be the first active player to do or be anything if you’re not, well, actively playing. | This could potentially be a big story, but it feels uncomfortably close to the still ongoing story of Jason Collins. Last April, veteran NBA big man Jason Collins, most recently of the Washington Wizards, came out as gay in a landmark feature for Sports Illustrated. While it was rightfully hailed as the first step towards a sports world where LGBT individuals would feel no need to hide their identities, the story seems much less notable now that after nearly a year, Collins still finds himself without a team. You can’t really be the first active player to do or be anything if you’re not, well, actively playing. |
| Sam’s announcement, as welcome and overdue as it is, really won’t be a breakthrough until he appears in a meaningful NFL game and that might still never happen. Over the next few months, expect Sam to join Collins in sports media limbo, almost a major story but just not quite. Be prepared for nonstop speculation about which pro team signs Michael Sam, or whether or not any team actually will, which will be followed by even more speculation that won’t stop until he’s finally on the field, if that even happens. Only then, it seems, can we retroactively go back and authenticate Sam’s announcement as being meaningful, it’s like waiting for an umpiring crew to confirm an on-the-field ruling before celebrating a game-winning touchdown. | |
| It all feels a bit arbitrary. For instance, what are we talking about whem we’re using the word “sports” here? Even after Collins’s initial argument, many were quick to point out that this wasn’t exactly a first for US sports. After all, there was Robbie Rogers in the MLS and a laundry list of worthy players in the world of women’s professional athletics who have been openly out, but it doesn’t really count because these sports don’t have the same cultural weight as the NFL or NBA do. | |
| So we keep making these exceptions, that athlete X doesn’t count because their sport isn’t popular enough or athlete Y doesn’t count because they haven’t appeared in a game since they’ve came out. These all feel like excuses to hide the fact that we are waiting for an athlete who is already well-known, someone who has an actual public image on the line, someone who is willing to risk possibly life-altering changes to their reputation, popularity, career and earnings. Jason Collins getting a 10 day contract from the Milwaukee Bucks or Michael Sam playing a few snaps for the Jacksonville Jaguars won’t really get us the story that we want to see. It wouldn’t have been the same if a fringe bullpen pitcher or a close-to-retired pinch-hitter broke the color barrier in baseball and not Jackie Robinson. A backup shooting guard on a last place team revealing that he contracted HIV would not have had the same weight as when Magic Johnson made his announcement. | So we keep making these exceptions, that athlete X doesn’t count because their sport isn’t popular enough or athlete Y doesn’t count because they haven’t appeared in a game since they’ve came out. These all feel like excuses to hide the fact that we are waiting for an athlete who is already well-known, someone who has an actual public image on the line, someone who is willing to risk possibly life-altering changes to their reputation, popularity, career and earnings. Jason Collins getting a 10 day contract from the Milwaukee Bucks or Michael Sam playing a few snaps for the Jacksonville Jaguars won’t really get us the story that we want to see. It wouldn’t have been the same if a fringe bullpen pitcher or a close-to-retired pinch-hitter broke the color barrier in baseball and not Jackie Robinson. A backup shooting guard on a last place team revealing that he contracted HIV would not have had the same weight as when Magic Johnson made his announcement. |
| This is partly what Drew Magary talked about on Deadspin on Monday, a day after Sam’s public coming out: | This is partly what Drew Magary talked about on Deadspin on Monday, a day after Sam’s public coming out: |
| This is getting tiring. This can end TODAY with one quality starter on one football or basketball team pulling a Neil Patrick Harris and then going on about his business. By coming out and being so admirably open, Sam has made this process even easier. He’s the perfect ambassador. And yet, if no one joins him, he still might find himself on the discard pile. And if that happens, the chance will be lost again. Players like Sam will continue to stick their necks out and get guillotined as long as it remains easy for GMs to collectively blacklist a gay player who is either a) a marginal talent or b) can easily be portrayed as a marginal talent. | |
| Now Magary’s main point here is clearly the possibility that Collins and Sam won’t get a fair shot because they’re ultimately replaceable, which may or may not be the case (if nothing else, that suspicion will be a big reason why the later rounds of the NFL Draft will be must-see television this year). What’s more interesting is the hidden undercurrent behind Magary’s cynical, but probably valid, take on the Michael Sam announcement: when we’re talking about an “athlete coming out” we’re not really talking about a “professional athlete” we’re really talking about a “famous athlete”. | Now Magary’s main point here is clearly the possibility that Collins and Sam won’t get a fair shot because they’re ultimately replaceable, which may or may not be the case (if nothing else, that suspicion will be a big reason why the later rounds of the NFL Draft will be must-see television this year). What’s more interesting is the hidden undercurrent behind Magary’s cynical, but probably valid, take on the Michael Sam announcement: when we’re talking about an “athlete coming out” we’re not really talking about a “professional athlete” we’re really talking about a “famous athlete”. |
| This, of course, is our problem, the problem for those of us whose business is in buying and selling narratives, and not the problem of the athletes involved. What’s important is that announcements like Michael Sam’s on Sunday will make it easier and easier for future athletes, at all levels, to feel comfortable and open about who they are. To quote Kate Fagen of ESPN: | This, of course, is our problem, the problem for those of us whose business is in buying and selling narratives, and not the problem of the athletes involved. What’s important is that announcements like Michael Sam’s on Sunday will make it easier and easier for future athletes, at all levels, to feel comfortable and open about who they are. To quote Kate Fagen of ESPN: |
| Maybe we were betting on the big-name quarterback or point guard, the Cy Young winner or NHL All-Star, because we imagined that the effect would be akin to watching a large rock smash through glass. We wanted all the old stereotypes – you know, the ones about what kind of guy and what kind of player can be gay – shattered all at once. | |
| But in retrospect, it was never going to happen that way. Instead, Sam is showing us how the majority of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender change will occur within sports: a gradual but steady flow starting at the high school and college levels, eventually rising up to the pros. | |
| Now, yes, eventually there will be the Big Out Sports Superstar but maybe it never really was possible for them to be among the first to come out. Maybe the process has to start with players with far less at stake, whether that’s a NBA veteran facing the tail end of their career or a NFL draft hopeful not expected to even sniff the first few rounds. While we can all make our own educated guesses as what it might be like for a pro athlete to come out, nobody really knew what the reaction would be until now. Think of Jason Collins and Michael Sam as trial balloons, canaries in the coalmine that is an often toxic locker room culture. | Now, yes, eventually there will be the Big Out Sports Superstar but maybe it never really was possible for them to be among the first to come out. Maybe the process has to start with players with far less at stake, whether that’s a NBA veteran facing the tail end of their career or a NFL draft hopeful not expected to even sniff the first few rounds. While we can all make our own educated guesses as what it might be like for a pro athlete to come out, nobody really knew what the reaction would be until now. Think of Jason Collins and Michael Sam as trial balloons, canaries in the coalmine that is an often toxic locker room culture. |
| Who knows, maybe we will get so used to this process through the following months and years that by the time that first big name finally does come out it won’t end up being a huge story after all. That might just be the greatest possible outcome of them all, even if it doesn’t help anyone’s ratings or page-views. | Who knows, maybe we will get so used to this process through the following months and years that by the time that first big name finally does come out it won’t end up being a huge story after all. That might just be the greatest possible outcome of them all, even if it doesn’t help anyone’s ratings or page-views. |