By Jack Hooker
In the wake of Missouri defensive tackle Michael Sam’s announcement that he is homosexual, Newton South football players and coaches say they would welcome a gay teammate.
Sam recently told ESPN that he is homosexual, meaning that the University of Missouri graduate could potentially become the first active gay player in the NFL.
Newton South’s head football coach Ted Dalicandro believes that Sam coming out will change some players’ negative images of homosexuals playing football.
“I think its a sport that for years for some reason wasn’t very accepting, but times have definitely changed for the better,” Dalicandro said. “I think that it’s great for everybody and for the NFL that someone is comfortable enough to come out and be who he is without worrying about anything.”
With 11.5 sacks and 19 tackles for losses, Sam was the SEC defensive player of the year. Standing at six-foot-two, 255 pounds, the defensive end is projected to be drafted in the mid to late rounds of the 2014 NFL draft.
“I understand how big this is,” Sam said in an interview with ESPN. “It’s a big deal. No one has done this before. And it’s kind of a nervous process, but I know what I want to be … I want to be a football player in the NFL.”
Most of Sam’s teammates have been supportive; however, Missouri tight end Rufus Warren publicly disagreed with Sam’s sexual orientation.
“I look down on gay football players… This is a MAN sport! And being gay is not a man,” Warren posted on twitter. “This sport is too violent for [you] to go home to another man at night.”
Despite Warren’s contention, according to an ESPN survey of 51 anonymous NFL players, 86 percent of the players would be okay having a gay teammate.
Dalicandro says that as a coach or even a teammate, he couldn’t imagine pushing a player away for his skin color, sexual orientation or any other reason. He hopes that managers and other players will see Sam for whom he is on the field because everyone has their own personal life.
“As long as you’re a fair player, you play well and you’re gonna help us win, then [your sexual orientation] shouldn’t matter,” Dalicandro said. “The ultimate goal is to win.”
Dalicandro believes that he has built a sense of trust and respect which makes any differences among teammates on the South football team unimportant.
South class of 2013 graduate Patrick Fabrizio, who plays football at Bowdoin College, has noticed a decrease in derogatory terms for homosexuals being used in college compared to those used at South.
He says that using degrading words for homosexuals is more discouraged on the football team at Bowdoin after the football coaches educated the players at a mandatory football meeting about using that kind of language.
Like Dalicandro, Fabrizio said he doesn’t care about his teammates’ sexual orientation as long as they can help the team win.
“I would support any player who plays with a lot of effort regardless of their sexual orientation,” Fabrizio said. “As long as you can bring the same level of intensity and get after people, it does not matter to me.”
Fabrizio’s brother, South’s junior captain Wesley Fabrizio, admits that he is guilty of using the word gay as a derogatory term. He says that he would have to become more sensitive to using these words if there were a homosexual player on the team; however, Wesley believes that they have evolved, and said that he does not mean them in a hurtful way.
Wesley wants the best and most committed players on the field next to him, regardless of their sexual orientation, he said, though he recognizes that some of his teammates may feel differently.
“We are very close as a team, and the nature of the sport requires a lot of physical contact,” Wesley said. “I am sure that members of the team would feel uncomfortable engaging in this contact with an openly gay person.”
Junior wide receiver Michael Garfinkle agrees with Wesley that some players on the South team might not like it, but he believes that good teammates have each others’ backs no matter what.
“Being nasty at football has nothing to do with who you love,” he said. “If someone’s gonna do their part on a team of mine then I don’t care who they choose to love.”
