From Ramon Johnson,
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John Amaechi is the first NBA player to come out of the closet. The announcement was made on February 7, 2006 just before the release of his autobiography Man in the Middle. Mr. Amaechi took some time with Gay Life to talk about his calculated coming out process, his new book and misconceptions about homophobia in pro sports.

When did you come out to yourself?

I came out to myself in my early 20's, but I didn't come out to family until after that.

Did your family worry about your sexuality when you started your professional career in the NBA?

Most of their worries were about my happiness as opposed to anything else. My sisters were concerned about the impact on my career because I was a known name.

Obviously that affected your decision to stay in the closet...

Their words didn't affect it, but my own thoughts were centered around that same thing, like: What happens to my charity? What happens to my work with young people? What happens?

Did you ever imagine coming out while you were still an active player in the NBA?

Yes, I knew it would happen eventually. It was the how of it that I wanted to control. I knew there was a chance it could happen out of my control while I was playing. I wasn't terrified, but I wanted to do it in a way that I could control to make sure that the message was confluent and coherent and that I was mentally, physically and emotionally resilient.

What was the worst that would have happened if you had come out during a season?

There's loads of bad things that could happen. I mean, you've got the chaos that would happen around me—which would affect the way the team played, the way I played, and the way we interacted. Coming out has to be done very sensibly because it's not just about talking to the people you play with. That's important, but it's also about the management, the coaches, the ownership, the league as a whole and the 50,000 people who watch you play. To me, it's not just the group of people you have to consider yourself with. Coming out out of frustration or anger isn't a good way of doing it, I don't think.

Is that careful calculation rooted in the perceived homophobia in pro sports?

The is no perceived homophobia in professional sports. There is homophobia in professional sports. There's homophobia in society that is expressed in lots of different facets. Some places you can play and potentially get fired [for being gay], some places you just won't be very well received or you fear that you won't be well received by the ownership. Regardless of what you are, there's this psychological and emotional pressure of dealing with that on top of a job that requires your total concentration.

Why do you think it's so difficult for pro sports, especially, to accept anything beyond this macho image of heterosexuality?

I don't think it's a pro sports issue; I think it's a workplace issue. There are many jobs where the vast majority of gay people within those jobs don't come out. It's pointless to me to look at pro sports and say, 'That's where most gay men don't come out,' when you can go through most offices and realize that the percentage of out gay people is very small and the percentage of closeted gay people is very large. It's not just because of the masculinity aspect that makes [coming out] more difficult with sports; it's the exposure.

It's not that pro sports are so homophobic and all of these people are so ignorant and bigoted. That's not the case at all. Some of them are, but there's a scale of things, just like there is in society.

Yes, there are a few out people in Hollywood, but I don't suggest to you that there are a very many more closeted people within the system of Hollywood than there are within basketball. If they are not comfortable in Hollywood coming out, why would it follow that they would be comfortable in basketball.

What was it like being in the locker room knowing you were gay?

As I describe in my book, Man In The Middle, it's a posture as opposed to something that I believe most gay people feel vehemently. It's certainly an attitude that people take: I am butch, I am macho, I am a real man, therefore I am homophobic. It's just a posture. I think some of people have a visceral reaction that they don't like gay people, but a vast majority of them expect that it's the thing to do. They are expected to say things about gay people that are horrible.

But I would say that the homophobia that I experienced in the locker room is eclipsed very easily by the amount homophobia I feel walking on college campuses or walking down the corridors of high schools.

Talk about Man in the Middle.

Man in the Middle is not just a titillating memoir or a sports book; it's inspirational and motivational. I hope that I can be an example. My book is a story about a fat 17-year-old kid who wants to be invisible but ends up being something very special. If there is one overriding theme in the book it's that the most unlikely of people can be in the most unlikely of circumstances and achieve extraordinary things.

If you could send one message to the Tim Hardaways and other homophobes out there, what would it be?

That diversity is inevitable. Harnessing diversity is about performance and allowing everyone around you to perform at their very best—in sports, in college, in whatever industry it may be.

Since your announcement, NBA commissioner David Stern has talked about diversity in the NBA. How do you think that can be implemented practically?

Commissioner Stern's gesture is very important to start the change. Beyond that, real education is necessary to make people think about the words they are saying and the damage that those kind of ideas and thoughts can do to young people.