While five years is a long time to wait for our brothers and sisters in the Castro, it’s the earliest the team can move per contracts with the City of Oakland.

Photo: Kyle Terada-US PRESSWIRE

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What is it about sports that brings out the crazy in people? And straight guys, in particular. Okay, I don’t know the shooter’s orientation – but I’d bet a hot nickle. There’s a reason a gay bar of 300 guys needs two security guards…and a straight bar of 300 needs 10 guards. For whatever reason, some straight guys get their wires crossed when their favorite team wins. They either find a cop car to burn…or they find a fight with some fellow fans.

I hope they have TNT and ESPN in jail….

PHOTO: Oklahoma City Thunder guard Russell Westbrook (0) reacts to a play against the Los Angeles Lakers during the second half in game five of the Western Conference semifinals of the 2012 NBA Playoffs at Chesapeake Energy Arena. Mandatory Credit: Mark D. Smith-US PRESSWIRE

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I have the feeling that pro-athlete photos like Humphries’ will become increasingly common. Pro soccer player Lance Parker hasn’t been afraid to show off his body. And there’s more and more money for men with lean bodies to take off their clothes in front of a camera.

A little insight into the photo shoot, from HollywoodLife.com:

Kris, 27, was apparently interested in doing the shoot because of the James Bond action hero theme and “he thought it would be a fun thing to do. He’s a guy, so the action figure theme was appealing. Plus, he wanted to help out his friend, stylist Derek Warburton, who is WestEast‘s fahion director,” an insider told Hollywoodlife.com.

While European athletes have been naked in videos, photos and ad campaigns for a decade, American pro athletes are starting to break into this more and more. We’re not complaining!

By the way, did you notice the automatic weapon in the background of the photo? What were you looking at?

You can see more of Chris Logan’s work on his Web site.

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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 culture of allyship. Using in-depth analyses and ratings of professional league and team policies and practices pertinent to LGBT athletes and fans, an Athletic Equality Index (AEI) would assess criteria like the inclusivity of employment benefits, and the adequacy of fan codes of conduct on and franchise responses to LGBT issues. Each resulting report would expose teams who fall short, celebrate teams who excel, and recommend areas of improvement, all together guiding teams toward major policy advances and organizational commitments to equality.

It’s hard to say if it would benefit athletes, since so many of them are largely told which team they’re going to play for. Still, front-office employees would have a better understanding of where they may want to work. Plus, it may benefit fans who would gravitate toward (or away from) gay-friendly teams.

Does sports need an index like this? Read Hudson’s full column.

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We present our favorite photos of the past sports week.

This week’s offerings include baseball and soccer celebrations, college football in the spring, the NBA, fencing, Olympic trials kayaking, swimming and Cristiano Ronaldo.

Click image for larger view (and on that image for an even larger view):

Photo 1: Cristiano Ronaldo of Real Madrid celebrates after scoring a goal during a match against Real Sporting de Gijon in Madrid, Spain. (Photo by Denis Doyle-Getty Images)

Photo 2: John Hastings during his second K1 run at the U.S. Olympic Team Trials at the U.S. National Whitewater Center in Charlotte, N.C. (Photo by Bob Donnan-US PRESSWIRE)

Photo 3: Jeff Spear in between bouts at the Division I National Fencing Championships in Virginia Beach (Photo by Peter Casey-US PRESSWIRE)

Photo 4: Australian swimmer Mitch Larkin poses during an Olympics portrait session in Brisbane, Australia. (Photo by Matt Roberts-Getty Images)

Photo 5: Australian swimmer Mitch Larkin poses during an Olympics portrait session in Brisbane, Australia. (Photo by Matt Roberts-Getty Images)

Photo 6: Miami Marlins catcher Brett Hayes (9) makes a play against the Chicago Cubs (Photo by Steve Mitchell-US PRESSWIRE)

Photo 7: Craig Beattie of the Hearts celebrates after scoring a penalty during The William Hill Scottish Cup semifinal soccer match between Celtic and Hearts in Glasgow, Scotland. (Photo by Jeff J Mitchell-Getty Images)

Photo 8: Oklahoma City Thunder guard Russell Westbrook (0) battles with Los Angeles Clippers forwards Caron Butler (5) and Blake Griffin (32) (Photo by Kirby Lee/Image of Sport-US PRESSWIRE)

Photo 9: Denver Broncos wide receiver Eric Decker speaks to the media following the team’s offseason workout (Photo by Ron Chenoy-US PRESSWIRE)

Photo 10: Stanford Cardinal quarterback Josh Nunes at the cardinal and white spring game at Kezar Stadium (Photo by Kelley L Cox-US PRESSWIRE)

Photo 11: New York Mets third baseman David Wright during batting practice prior to playing the Philadelphia Phillies (Photo by Howard Smith-US PRESSWIRE)

Photo 12: Atlanta Braves right fielder Jason Heyward celebrates with teammates after hitting a home run against the Milwaukee Brewers. (Photo by Daniel Shirey-US PRESSWIRE)

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Rick Welts (Photo: Kyle Terada-US PRESSWIRE)

A year ago, Rick Welts was known only in the NBA world as an executive with the Phoenix Suns. Then came a front-page story in the New York Times in May, where he came out as a gay man and his world changed. He suddenly was seen as a positive force for change in a sports world still rife with homophobia.

Now the president of the Golden State Warriors, Welts reflected on the past year in an interview with Mark Emmons of the San Jose Mercury News, and the news has been nothing but good.

“It probably wasn’t as hard as you might think because I had this amazing group of friends and family who embraced my entire life,” Welts said. “It was just this one part of my life that I kept quiet because I did fear what the consequences would be if I shared that. Maybe it was somewhat of a burden, but it’s not like I had this tortured life.”

Welts left the Suns and moved to the Bay Area to be with his partner, flight attendant Todd Gage. He had no intention to going back to the NBA, but was offered the job by an ownership fully aware it was hiring a gay man. Joe Lacob, one of the owners of the Warriors, remembered their interview when he brought up Welts’ New York Times story:

“I felt like not mentioning it would almost be as bad as making too big a deal out of it,” Lacob said. “I wanted to acknowledge it, talk about the reaction and then move on. I respect him for what he did, but it’s just not a relevant issue with doing the job. And you cannot find a negative reference on Rick Welts.”

Welts says he is often asked about when a pro athlete will come out and his reply that it’s eventually going to happen.

“It’s going to be much more heroic than what I did,” he said. “It’s just a different set of circumstances that an athlete would be facing. But I think we’re on a course where that’s just going to be inevitable.”

It’s been great to see Welts embrace being a role model, which was going to happen once he came out. It’s also great to see an ownership that will judge Welts about his performance in his job, not his sexual orientation.

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You can see the full video at USA Today.

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Dave Kopay started paving the way in the '70s

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 next two years.

While most of the attention in the last couple weeks has been on gays in the NHL, it’s Major League Baseball where a plurality of voters think that player will be. MLB got 47% of the vote…almost half. The NHL was a distance second with 24%. The NFL was last with 11%, just behind the NBA’s 17%.

While some people may say “that’s way too late” because of the recent advances in sports, I personally voted for June 2016. We’ve seen these “watershed” gay moments in sports before, after which athletes were supposed to come streaming out of the closet. Dave Kopay came out in 1975 thinking a wave of athletes would follow him. He’s still waiting, 36 years later. The Gay Games launched in 1982; Nothing. Billy Bean came out in 1999 and that was supposed to change things. Laveranues Coles revealed he was sexually assaulted as a child, and Mike Silver said that would open the closet doors. That was 2005.

Interestingly, the third most-common guess in Slate’s poll was March 2020, eight years from now.

Other people say it will “absolutely” happen in the next year, others say two years. It could happen tomorrow; The thing is, no one knows and no one can predict it. But I’m not holding my breath.

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The atmosphere turned even weirder when Cuban began telling the story of how he’d almost fired a Mavs employee for encouraging Dallas fans to do the wave. Cuban hates the wave. “I’d rather have 60 minutes of Kiss Cam,” he said, to laughs. Simmons has long been on record as being a fan of the Kiss Cam — he’s even jokingly suggested that it become its own TV show — and piped up in favor of it. “I like the Kiss Cam,” Simmons said.

“That’s because you and your boyfriend are always on it,” Cuban spat. He quickly tried to backtrack, mumbling something about what he’d just said not being a gender-specific remark. Except, as Yahoo!’s Ball Don’t Lie blog quickly tweeted, that it was clearly a very gender specific remark.

As I always do with these “incidents,” I measure it against what I would do. Would I try to demean another man by saying he has a boyfriend? Heck no! But Cuban went there. To him, at some level, saying someone has a “boyfriend” is demeaning. I doubt it was conscious, but when he was riffing that’s what came out — and often that’s when we get a glimpse into the truth. Reason to boycott the Dallas Mavericks? No. Reason for him to give some thoughtful consideration to what he said? Yes. Every incident like this puts a brick back into the wall of homophobia around sports.

Mark Cuban wrote as much on his blog:

I made a mistake in making the comment. I wasn’t trying to be hurtful. It wasn’t a comment on anyone’s sexuality. It was just me trying to be funny. It wasn’t. I quickly realized it and tried to fix it. I hoped at the time I didn’t offend anyone.

This blog post is not about trying  to defend what I said. I’m not trying to defend my sense of humor. I’m not trying to convince you I’m not a homophobe. I’m not trying to justify anything at all.

I guess what I am doing is admitting that at some level I am prejudiced and that I recognize that I am .  There are a lot of things in my life that I need to improve at. This is one of them. Sometimes I make stupid throw away comments that I quickly realize are wrong. It doesn’t happen often, but it happens. It was a mistake and I realized it. I learned from it.

Of course, he waited until he got caught; He didn’t write this apology when it happened a week ago. Still, good for him. We would expect some sensitivity on this from Cuban. He is not an enemy of the gay community.

What sucks is that ESPN edited Cuban’s “boyfriend” comment out of Simmons’ podcast. It’s kind of crappy of them: They shouldn’t protect people who make dumb comments like this, even if they are big assets for ESPN.

Hat tip to Kelvin C.

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The guys at Manhunt Daily found the 11-minute reading a bit long, so they cut it down to 60 seconds, transforming a reading for kids…into “Kevin Love Whispers a Love Letter to My Taint.” Who knew the book features the word “wet” so many times. Watch the video here, along with Tim Tebow reading Green Eggsssssssssss and Ham: 

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