By Peter Dreier/The Conversation
In his 1990 autobiography, Behind the Mask: My Double Life in Baseball, Dave Pallone, a gay major league umpire who was quietly fired in 1988 after rumors about his sexual orientation circulated in the baseball world, contended that there were enough gay major league players to create an All-Star team.
Since then, attitudes and laws about homosexuality have changed. High-profile figures in business, politics, show business, education, the media, the military and sports have come out of the closet.
Athletes in three of the five major U.S. male team sports – the NBA, the NFL and MLS – have come out while still playing, with NFL player Carl Nassib and NHL prospect Luke Prokop coming out in summer 2021.
Meanwhile, according to OutSports magazine, at least 185 publicly out LGBTQ athletes – 90% of them women – participated in this summer’s Tokyo Olympic Games, more than in all previous Summer Olympics combined.
But among the more than 20,000 men who have played major league baseball, not one has publicly come out of the closet while still in uniform.
Posted on November 1, 2021