We present our favorite photos of the past sports week. This week’s offerings include celebrating a no-hitter, rugby practice, a shirtless soccer celebration, spring college football, baseball, NHL playoffs, Aussie Rules Football and track and field. Click image for larger, full-sized view and on that image for the largest view: Share on Facebook
Posts under ‘MLB’
Who are Major League Baseball’s sexiest players?
Our friend Kathy Lyford at FoxSports.com has brought us a list of the sexiest players in Major League Baseball. The New York Yankees seem to be the most-represented team (including Robinson Cano, right), followed by the Seattle Mariners. The Phillies, Rays, Cardinals, Angels, Dodgers and Twins all get some good lovin’. Others on the list [...]
Oakland A’s pitcher Brandon McCarthy takes stronger stand for gays, against homophobia
Oakland A’s pitcher Brandon McCarthy has expounded on his stance against homophobia. He previously tweeted about seeing the Kiss Cam mock gay people. San Francisco Chronicle columnist Gwen Knapp covered his latest comments with a great column: “There’s that stupid, little comedic value of it if you don’t really think about what it implies,” he [...]
Athletic Equality Index for pro sports teams?
Hudson Taylor would like to see the sports world follow HRC’s corporate index and institute and Athletic Equality Index to determine just how gay-friendly each pro sports team is. Though professional sports are moving in a positive direction, they need the transparency and metrics of an equality index to institutionalize a proactive rather than reactive [...]
Brandon McCarthy, Oakland A’s pitcher, against gay Kiss Cam ‘jokes’
Oakland A’s pitcher Brandon McCarthy tweeted that he’s tired of Kiss Cams focusing on two guys kissing. At first blush, it might look like Brandon McCarthy is homophobic; In reality, he’s tired of society laughing at gay men and is fighting against the subversive homophobia that locks the Kiss Cam on two (presumably) straight men [...]
Ozzie Guillen suspended five games for ‘I love Castro’ comment. More than ‘fag’ punishment.
Miami Marlins manager Ozzie Guillen got a five-game suspension for singing the praises of Cuban dictator Fidel Castro. Miami has a strong Cuban community and many of them are not big fans of Castro, having fled the country at some point since his family’s rule began. Guillen claims his words were “misinterpreted” and that he [...]
Carl Pavano of Minnesota Twins target of extortion alleging gay relationship
Minnesota Twins pitcher Carl Pavano was the target of an extortion attempt by a former high school classmate. According to the Meriden (Conn.) Record-Journal, Christian Bedard, 36, contacted Pavano’s sister, Michelle DeGennaro, claiming he had a three-year “emotional and physical relationship” with the big league pitcher while the two where in high school. From the Record-Journal: [...]
Slate readers: Pro athlete will come out October 2014, will be in baseball
Slate.com asked its readers to predict when a professional male athlete in the United States will come out of the closet. The average: October 2014. The most common guess was June 2013, with the majority of voters saying it will be by the spring of 2014. Either way, their readers think it’ll be in the [...]
Bryce Harper: Batting without his gloves ‘hurts like a dick’
The latest “can’t-miss” baseball phenom is Washington Nationals outfield Bryce Harper. Will Leitch met up with him for a GQ feature story on the loud-mouthed 19-year-old prospect who is supposed to shatter home run records in Major League Baseball. From what we can tell, he’s also a real jackass, blowing kisses to pitchers as he [...]
Major League Baseball sponsors GLAAD Awards
Major League Baseball has signed on as a “Young Adult Patron” for this year’s GLAAD Media Awards, which kick off next weekend at the New York Marriott Marquis. The sponsorship has a value of $10,000 and will underwrite tickets for 500 youth across all three shows (NY, LA and SF), according to GLAAD’s Aaron McQuade. [...]
Former St. Louis Cardinal Bob Tewksbury supports same-sex marriage in New Hampshire
Former St. Louis Cardinals All-Star pitcher Bob Tewksbury has voiced his support of same-sex marriage rights in New Hampshire. He and his wife, Laura, live in Concord, N.H., where Tewksbury was born. They have joined Standing Up for New Hampshire Families to stop the state legislature from removing same-sex marriage rights in the Granite State. [...]
Advocate’s list of 2011′s top news lacks major sports stories
First let me say that we love our friends at The Advocate. The iconic gay-news publication has done great work for decades. But I remember when we were presented with our first NLGJA Award years ago the presenter said it was in part because we were not afraid to criticize the media’s handling of gay-sports [...]
Los Angeles Dodgers release an It Gets Better video
The Los Angeles Dodgers have released a terrific It Gets Better video that features several players and manager Don Mattingly. This video is even more noteworthy coming from an organization whose longtime ex-manager Tommy Lasorda never acknowledged that his son Tommy Jr. (“Spunky”) was gay and died of AIDS. Watch: Share on Facebook
Moment #8: John Rocker spews homophobia to ‘Sports Illustrated’
Part of Outsports’ series on our 100 most important moments in gay sports history. Baseball, 1999. When Jeff Pearlman was assigned by Sports Illustrated in 1999 to write a story about Atlanta Braves relief pitcher John Rocker, he was expecting to pen an image-rehabilitation article. Pearlman told Outsports this week: I knew he was something of [...]
New York Mets hosting gay night Sept. 26
When I hosted the first LGBT Community Night with the New York Mets in 2004, it took a lot of convincing for them to open the doors for the event. One of their big concerns was how to handle a transgender person using the restroom. Now the team itself is reviving the LGBT Community night [...]
All of a sudden, Red Sox and Rays give us a race to watch in September
Just a couple weeks ago, baseball’s talking heads were repeating the same line: “What a boring September. All the races are over.” I guess the Tampa Bay Rays never got that memo. When they woke up on Sept. 3 they were 9.5 games behind the Boston Red Sox for the AL wild card position; They’re [...]
Moment #25: Mike Piazza announces, ‘I’m not gay. I’m heterosexual.’
Part of Outsports’ series on our 100 most important moments in gay sports history. Baseball, 2002. In the June/July 2002 issue of Details magazine, then-New York Mets manager Bobby Valentine said he believed baseball was ready for an openly gay player. The New York Post, as they so often do, ran with it and wondered [...]
Moment #32: ‘Out’ magazine editor Brendan Lemon reveals relationship with MLB player
Part of Outsports’ series on our 100 most important moments in gay sports history. Baseball, 2001. When Out magazine published an editor’s letter by editor Brendan Lemon in May 2001, it caused a stir in the sports world that no gay publication had caused before. Lemon’s letter revealed a relationship he was having with a [...]
Tampa Bay Rays say ‘It Gets Better’ with Johnny Damon, Joe Maddon, others
The Tampa Bay Rays have joined the growing list of MLB teams to create an ‘It Gets Better’ video. Included in the video are players Johnny Damon (right), BJ Upton, Sam Fuld, Sean Rodriguez (who sends a message in Spanish) and manager Joe Maddon. Damon talks about being teased because he had a stuttering problem: [...]
Seattle Mariners ‘It Gets Better’ video features Seahawk, Storm and Sounder
The ‘It Gets Better’ videos produced by Major League Baseball teams keep breaking new ground. The most recent is the Seattle Mariners video, which includes players from four Seattle-based pro sports teams. Mariners relief pitcher Brandon League and infielder Brendan Ryan are there, but so are Seattle Seahawk wide receiver Mike Williams, MLS players Mike Fucito and [...]