{"id":1977,"date":"2022-08-01T23:45:05","date_gmt":"2022-08-01T23:45:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thestandardps.com\/?p=1977"},"modified":"2022-08-01T23:45:08","modified_gmt":"2022-08-01T23:45:08","slug":"in-a-league-of-their-own","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thestandardps.com\/?p=1977","title":{"rendered":"In A League Of Their Own"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Sha-wing Batter!<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Queer Facts About America\u2019s Favorite Pastime<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

by Mikey Rox<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The boys of summer are back \u2013 and you know what that means: All them butts! Aside from gawking at your baseball favorite players\u2019 posteriors in form-fitting pinstriped pants, there are plenty of queer cheers to give for America\u2019s national pastime. Batter up!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Glenn Burke broke the first barrier \u2013 but it may have cost him<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

As an outfielder for the Los Angeles Dodgers from 1976 to \u201978 (and widely regarded co-inventor of the high-five \u2013 true story), Glenn Burke broke ground as the first active MLB player to come out as gay to his teammates and bosses. While he was asked to refrain from making his sexual orientation public by Dodgers\u2019 top brass, Burke told People<\/em> magazine in 1994 that his \u201cmission as a gay ballplayer was to break a stereotype\u201d and he thought it worked. In other interviews and in his autobiography, however, he suggested that prejudice drove him out of the sport, not the injury that sent him back down to the minors after a year with the Oakland Athletics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The A\u2019s released Burke from his contract before the end of his injured farm-team season, and he retired from the game in 1980.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the initial years following his retirement, Burke competed in 100- and 200-meter sprints at the inaugural Gay Games in 1982 and in basketball at the 1986 Games, and for many years he played for the San Francisco Gay Softball League. Burke died of complications from AIDS in 1995.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Burke befriended Tommy Lasorda Jr. \u2013 and Tommy Senior wasn\u2019t happy about it<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Legendary Dodgers manager Tommy Lasorda Sr. \u2013 who led the team to two World Series championships, four National League pennants and eight division titles during his 20-year stewardship from 1976 to 1996 \u2013 had a gay son. Burke befriended the younger Lasorda Jr., which angered the \u201cfamily values\u201d manager, causing a rift that likely contributed to Burke being traded to the A\u2019s after three seasons in Los Angeles. Lasorda Jr. died of AIDS complications in 1991 at age 33. Lasorda Sr. died earlier this year without ever having admitted he had a gay son.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s been 23 years since the second MLB player publicly acknowledged his sexual orientation<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Billy Bean, an outfielder for the Detroit Tigers, L.A. Dodgers and San Diego Padres from 1987 to 1995, came out in the Miami Herald<\/em> in 1999, four years after retiring. Besides Burke, he remains the only other former MLB player to publicly acknowledge his homosexuality post-career; no active player has ever come out publicly and no former players have come out since. In 2003, Bean released his autobiography Going the Other Way: Lessons from a Life in and out of Major League Baseball<\/em>, and in 2014 he was named MLB\u2019s first Ambassador for Inclusion. In 2016 that role was expanded to Vice President of Social Responsibility and Inclusion, and today Bean serves as Vice President and Special Assistant to the Commissioner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The L.A. Dodgers are the only team with both players who have come out as gay<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Both Burke and Bean played for the Dodgers during their MLB careers \u2013 and as history tends to repeat itself, maybe there\u2019s a gayby on the Dodgers\u2019 roster right now. If that\u2019s true, here\u2019s hoping he has the courage to come out and make history while an active player, put the final nail in the coffin of the Dodgers\u2019 homophobic past, and serve as an inspiration to aspiring young pro ball players everywhere. No pressure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Statistics suggest there are dozens of closeted pro baseball players<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a 2015 article for the New York Times<\/em>, economist and public policy scholar Justin Wolfers wrote that based on the proportion of American men who have admitted to being gay or bisexual (though not necessarily out), there must be closeted MLB players actively taking the field. Thirty MLB teams each have 40-men rosters equaling 1,200 players who don\u2019t publicly identify as queer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf baseball players are as likely to be gay as other men their age \u2013 let\u2019s go with an estimate of 1 in 25 \u2013 then the odds that none of these men are gay is one in two sextillion,\u201d Wolfers wrote. \u201cA sextillion comes after a trillion, quadrillion and quintillion; it is a thousand billion billion.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course, there may be gay or bisexual men in MLB who have ripped a page from Burke\u2019s playbook and only confided within their own club. Time will tell.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lower-level pro ball has a much better coming-out average<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since Sean Conroy, former pitcher for the independent Sonoma Stompers, came out publicly in 2015 while still on the team\u2019s roster \u2013 the first-ever active pro ball player to do so \u2013 a handful of others have followed in his pioneering footsteps (at various stages of their careers), including MiLB players David Denson, Tyler Dunnington, Jason Burch, and John Dillinger.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are 30 MLB teams \u2013 and all but one of them host a Pride night<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Twenty-one years ago this summer, the Chicago Cubs kicked off MLB\u2019s Pride-night tradition with its now-annual \u201cOut at Wrigley\u201d celebration, and almost every club in the organization has followed suit. Twenty-eight teams in the United States and one in Canada host an evening of LGBTQ inclusiveness, usually with special ticket packages that include seats in a dedicated Pride section and rainbow-colored baseball swag. The lone holdout? The two-decades-too-late New York Yankees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Three years ago, the Yanks acknowledged the 50th<\/sup> anniversary of the Stonewall Uprising and honored five first-annual Yankees-Stonewall Scholarship winners in a special pre-game commemoration ceremony that unveiled a plaque behind the center-field fence dedicated to the occasion. Yet still no Pride night.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The San Francisco Giants made rainbow history for Pride 2021<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

MLB teams are known to incorporate cause-based logos and patches into their uniforms throughout the season, like the pink breast cancer awareness ribbon, for instance, or camouflage to show military appreciation. But on June 5, 2021, the San Francisco Giants became the first team in big-league history to rainbow-ize its uniforms, including a right-sleeve home jersey patch in Pride colors and a matching logo on players\u2019 hats, in celebration of its LGBTQ+ fans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We are extremely proud to stand with the LGBTQ+ community as we kick off one of the best annual celebrations in San Francisco by paying honor to the countless achievements and contributions of all those who identify as LGBTQ+ and are allies of the LGBTQ+ community,” San Francisco Giants CEO Larry Baer said in a statement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A scripted series about gay professional ball players may be coming soon<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Author Peter Lefcourt\u2019s novel, The Dreyfus Affair: A Love Story<\/em> (1992), about homophobia in baseball that follows two MLB players who get caught up in a sex scandal should be required reading for any on-the-spectrum queer sports fans, but if you\u2019re adverse to cracking open a dusty book, the live-action TV adaptation may be coming to a streaming service near you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Universal Television has optioned the novel for development with Oscar- and Emmy-winner David Frankel (The Devil Wears Prada<\/em>) tapped to direct and co-write the pilot with Lefcourt.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The project has been in development in some form for the past 28 years. Studios put the kibosh on Lefcourt\u2019s and Frankel\u2019s original movie scripts in 1996 \u2013 Disney was even interested as one point \u2013 citing lack of commercial appeal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But we all know that\u2019s just industry code for \u201cWe\u2019re too pussy to make this gay movie, so here\u2019s Evita<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These are the best butts in baseball according to Us<\/em> magazine<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\u2019s no definitive queer ranking of the best butts in baseball (and it\u2019s a shame there isn\u2019t) but a few years ago Us<\/em> magazine asked its readers, majority females, to rank MLB\u2019s greatest ass<\/em>ets. Phillies left fielder Rhys Hoskins, Cincinnati Reds pitcher Matt Harvey, New York Yankee Giancarlo Stanton, Nationals right fielder Bryce Harper, and Dodger Cody Bellinger rounded out the top five \u2013 figuratively and literally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Perfectly acceptable. Fine badonkadonks all around.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But are there better booties at-bat?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Consider Diamondback David Peralta, Los Angeles Angel Mike Trout, and Athletics catcher Sean Murphy the next time they take the plate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Seventh-inning stretch, anyone?Mikey Rox is an award-winning journalist and LGBT lifestyle expert whose work has been published in more than 100 outlets across the world. He currently works for the Atlanta Braves. Connect with Mikey on Instagram <\/em>@mikeyroxtravels<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sha-wing Batter! Queer Facts About America\u2019s Favorite Pastime by Mikey Rox The boys of summer are back \u2013 and you know what that means: All them butts! Aside from gawking at your baseball favorite players\u2019 posteriors in form-fitting pinstriped pants, there are plenty of queer cheers to give for America\u2019s national pastime. Batter up! Glenn Burke broke the first barrier \u2013 but it may have cost him As an outfielder for the Los Angeles Dodgers from 1976 to \u201978 (and widely regarded co-inventor of the high-five \u2013 true story), Glenn Burke broke ground as the first active MLB player to come out as gay to his teammates and bosses. While he was asked to refrain from making his sexual orientation public by Dodgers\u2019 top brass, Burke told People magazine in 1994 that his \u201cmission as a gay ballplayer was to break a stereotype\u201d and he thought it worked. In other interviews and in his autobiography, however, he suggested that prejudice drove him out of the sport, not the injury that sent him back down to the minors after a year with the Oakland Athletics. The A\u2019s released Burke from his contract before the end of his injured farm-team season, and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1982,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[2654,2657,2652,2659,2660,2653,2613,2661,2655,2658],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thestandardps.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1977"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thestandardps.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thestandardps.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thestandardps.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thestandardps.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1977"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.thestandardps.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1977\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1978,"href":"https:\/\/www.thestandardps.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1977\/revisions\/1978"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thestandardps.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1982"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thestandardps.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1977"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thestandardps.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1977"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thestandardps.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1977"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}