Gay rights and gay marriage have been hot topics this year. For as main stream as homosexual lifestyles have become, there are still no openly gay major league baseball players, which leads to the question: Is Baseball Ready for Openly Gay Players?

Question: Out-of-the-closet homosexuals have been elected to Congress and are prominent in many fields including entertainment, business, journalism, education, and even the clergy. As our American culture becomes more tolerant and open, many wonder… Is Baseball Ready for Openly Gay Players?

Answer: No, obviously not… or else there would be openly gay players in baseball.

Follow-up Question: What’s the deal with the lack of gay baseball players? Is it some weird coincidence or what?

Answer: Using standards of logic and statistics, there have to be some gay baseball players. But, apparently, none are willing to admit to their lifestyle because, hey, who wants to be the butt of all those jokes? (Literally and figuratively?) It seems as though major league baseball has a system similar, if not identical to the military’s, “don’t ask, don’t tell.” This is not an official policy, but is practiced so seriously that, to date, no gay player has been informally outed by a legitimate source (teammates, coaches, managers or sportswriters).

Speculation, however, exists. The quantity of rumors about his sexual prefernce inspired Mike Piazza to come out as heterosexual, in an effort to put the gossip about his sexuality to bed… to bed with a woman.

Even More Ridiculous Question: How can we form more educated guesses as to which baseball players are gay? Billy Bean came out after he retired in 1999. Is it fair to assume that those with cutesy cartoon names are the homosexual ones?

Answer: According to that theory, the following players may be gay, but more likely just have secret pornographic careers or need an alias to protect them from the media and/or authorities:

• The more well know Billy Beane
• Tim Spooneyberger
• Johnny Dickshot
• Coco Crisp
• Pete LaCock
• Dickie Flowers
• Rusty Kuntz
• Randy Bush

Question: What are the closest homosexual baseball players so afraid of?

Answer: Gay baseball players may be turned off to the idea of making their sexuality public for any of the following issues:

• Harassment from fans, paparazzi, teammates, players union, etc.
• Uncomfortable locker room situations, per popular homophobic concerns
• Overwhelming media stalking
• Increased stress to represent an entire community can correlate with negative effect on play
• Endless abuse of baseball puns… everything from “ball management,” to “glove-work” and, the always obvious, “playing for the other team.”
• Need for baseball card to be redesigned in a more esthetically pleasing fashion so that stereotypes are played into accordingly
• Pressure from gay community to behave in a certain manner, probably one that would suggest the gay player adopt some stereotypes and resist others
• Being traded or released by their team
• Losing endorsements

The last two issues are most interesting because there is little doubt that any team or corporation separating itself from an openly homosexual professional athlete could easily have discriminatory action taken against them.

Question: There have been openly gay players in solo sports, why not spread the love to the team?

Answer: Because as much as there is no “I” in team, there is no rainbow either. And hey, maybe having a “forbidden secret” is exciting to the closet-dwelling players.

Question: When will baseball be ready for this change?

Answer: Who knows? Vegas doesn’t even have odds on the subject!

Also posted on National Lampoon’s Splog