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>> ROSS: Welcome to SourceFed, I’m Ross Everett
With the world’s eyes on Russia and their anti-gay stance on athletes or people for
that matter, it’s about time we got some progressive gay sports news.
PROGRESSIVE GAY SPORTS NEWS. Woah, I didn’t know we had a graphic for
that. Pretty cool. THANKS.
When Missouri defensive tackle Michael Sam publicly announced that he was gay Sunday
night, he put himself in a position to make history. As the SEC player of the year there
is no question as to whether or not he’s going to be drafted in the 2014 NFL draft,
which makes his announcement all the more monumental; because when Michael Sam is drafted,
this will make him the first ever openly gay player in the NFL.
Having already come out to his college teammates in the summer of 2013, Michael said “Once
I became official to my teammates, I knew who I was. I knew that I was gay… I was
so proud of myself and I just didn’t care who knew.”
While there seems to be both some dissent and acceptance from those already in the league,
there has been an outpouring of support on Twitter from players and the league alike.
The NFL released a statement saying “We admire Michael Sam’s honesty and courage.
Michael is a football player. Any player with ability and determination can succeed in [the]
NFL.” Carolina Panthers running back DeAngelo Williams
said “I could care less about a man’s *** preference! I care about winning games
and being respectful in the locker room. Deion Sanders expressed “Michael Sam isn’t
the first gay player in the NFL although he is the first to come out. Let’s show him
love like a family member. Truth.” Sports Illustrated ran an article of anonymous
NFL sources expressing their thoughts that the league isn’t ready for an openly gay
player, with one unnamed assistant stating that it would “create a chemical imbalance
in the locker room”. Mind you, Sam isn’t the first gay player
in the NFL, as a few months ago a group of NFL players reportedly got cold feet and backed
out of a plan to come out publicly. Last year Jason Collins made headlines coming
out as the first openly gay NBA player, and it was only a matter of time before the professionals
in other sports would start to follow suit. What do you guys think about Michael Sam’s
announcement and the league’s reaction? Let us know in the comments below. Don’t
forget to like the video subscribe to the channel and click this annotation for our
five daily stories and videos across all our channels. I’m Ross Everett, and this has
been progressive gay sports news PROGRESSIVE GAY SPORTS NEWS!
I’m still blown away we have that graphic. DON’T UNDERESTIMATE ME.