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Check out our
most
complete list, along with our Rocker Scale
 Julian
Tavarez, Chicago Cubs
``Why should I care about the fans?'' Tavarez said after the game. ``They're a bunch of assholes and faggots here.''
More |
 Goran
Ivanisevic, Tennis
``Then I hit another second serve,
huge. And that ball was on the line, was not even close. And that
guy, he looks like a faggot little bit, you know. This hair all over
him. He call it. I couldn't believe he did it. More |
 Sacramento
Kings
According to the Sacramento Bee, the third-year point guard allegedly responded with the following: "Are you a fag?" "Are you gay?" "Do you remember the Vietnam War? I'll kill y'all just like that."
More |
 Allen
Iverson, Philadelphia 76ers
Iverson of the Philadelphia 76ers first was slammed for anti-gay lyrics in his rap album (he apologized for those). Then
on Jan. 28, in a game at Indiana, Iverson called a fan who was heckling him a faggot.
More
|
 John
Rocker, Atlanta Braves
‘‘Imagine having to take the 7 train to (Shea Stadium in New York) looking like you’re (in) Beirut next to some kid with purple hair, next to some queer with AIDS, right next to some dude who got out of jail for the fourth time, right next to some 20-year-old mom with four
kids. It’s depressing.’’ More |
Note: List of other
athletes making anti-gay comments is below. Updated with
Ivanisevic's post-Wimbledon and other remarks.
``They're
a bunch of ... faggots''
Cubs pitcher apologizes
for remarks
By Jim Buzinski
Outsports.com
For the third time this year, a pro athlete used the ``F''
word against a fan. This time the culprit is Chicago Cubs pitcher
Julian Tavarez.
Tavarez, a 27-year-old right-hander, lost his cool on
April 28 while being booed by fans in San Francisco in a 5-0 loss to the Giants. The fans were angry at Tavarez for a fight he had gotten into spring training with the Giants' Russ Davis and for his hard forearm tag of Marvin Benard.
``Why should I care about the fans?'' Tavarez said after the game. ``They're a bunch of assholes and faggots here.''
Tavarez, who played three years with the Giants, was roundly criticized
for his remarks by the media, Cubs president Andy MacPhail and his manager, Don Baylor.
``Did Tavarez understand what he was saying, the way he said it so calmly?'' asked San Francisco Chronicle columnist Gwen Knapp. ``He spent three years as a Giant. Surely, he knows that San Francisco is the gay capital of America. If someone wants to use the fashionable excuse that his remarks were `ill-considered,' Tavarez will have to explain how, with so little
consideration, he got his demographics right.''
The next day, prompted by Baylor, Tavarez apologized.
"I want to apologize to the city of San Francisco and say how sorry I am for what I said," Tavarez said. "I'm a very emotional man and I don't always mean what I say. Sometimes my emotions get the best of me. I am very sorry, very sorry."
This is progress. It took John Rocker, Allen Iverson and Jason Williams days or weeks to apologize (somewhat grudgingly) for their anti-gay comments. A lot of credit has to go to Cubs management, which was quick to condemn the remarks.
But baseball must send a further message by suspending and fining
Tavarez.
"I don't know what baseball is going to do, but I had to take care of what I could take care of within the team," Baylor told the Chicago Tribune. "He had to apologize to the team and the organization.
"He was wrong in what he said. He owed the city of San Francisco an apology, a sincere apology. A lot of times guys get caught up in a lot of emotional whatever, but ... we still haven't learned a lot from the Rocker situation."
Ironically, Tavarez began a five-game suspension Sunday for his spring-training fight with
Davis, and could be facing more off time if baseball punishes him for his remarks.
Davis was suspended for two games.
The apology was not enough for some members of Chicago's gay
community.
"I will never buy another ticket to a Cubs game or any of their paraphernalia as long as he's with the team," said George Cupka, a 48-year-old high school teacher
and softball player told the Chicago Tribune. "I don't want my money going to pay a bigot's salary.''
Players in a gay Chicago softball league told the Tribune that Tavarez should meet with about 2,000 gay Cubs fans expected to attend a game the day before
the June 24 Gay Pride Day.
"This is his chance to come out and learn that what he said was a stupid mistake," said
Jerry Pritikin, a gay softball pitcher. "He's talking about thousands and thousands of people, and he's painting them all with the same brush. When you sit down and really get to know gay people, only then do you realize that gays are like everybody else."
Tribune columnist Skip Bayless said a message must be sent to
athletes who make such comments:
``Tavarez has a right to his opinions as long as he doesn't express them in a public forum as a member of the Cubs. But he needs to be taught the difference. Another message needs to be sent rap-song strongly to all athletes. Recently Jason Williams of the Sacramento Kings used ethnic slurs while trading insults with fans.
``Bring down the hammer. Continue to show them their jock-god entitlement has its boundaries. Remind them they--unfortunately--influence kids' opinions.''
Tavarez is the fifth pro athlete in 18 months and the third this year to become embroiled in controversy for making derogatory remarks, including those about gays. A recap:
John Rocker
The Atlanta Braves redneck pitcher caused a sensation in Dec. 1999 with these statements to Sports Illustrated:
‘‘Imagine having to take the 7 train to (Shea Stadium in New York) looking like you’re (in) Beirut next to some kid with purple hair, next to some queer with AIDS, right next to some dude who got out of jail for the fourth time, right next to some 20-year-old mom with four kids,’’ Rocker said. ‘‘It’s depressing.’’
Rocker also attacked New York’s diversity: ‘‘The biggest thing I don’t like about New York are the foreigners,’’ he said. ‘‘You can walk an entire block in Times Square and not hear anybody speaking English. Asians and Koreans and Vietnamese and Indians and Russians and Spanish people and everything up there. How the hell did they get in this country?’’
Rocker was suspended for 60 days by baseball, but the suspension was cut in half by an arbitrator.
Allen Iverson
 Iverson of the Philadelphia 76ers first was slammed for anti-gay lyrics in his rap album (he apologized for those). Then
on Jan. 28, in a game at Indiana, Iverson called a fan who was heckling him a faggot. The exchange was caught by an NBC microphone and Iverson tried to weasel out of it by claiming the fan uttered racial slurs (something that was never proven). The player later
apologized and was fined $5,000 by the NBA.
Several Outsports readers protested his remarks to 76ers owner Pat
Croce.
Jason Williams Williams, Sacramento Kings guard, was fined $15,000 in March for making ethnic and gay slurs at a Golden State Warriors' fan during a Feb. 28 game.
The player said the fan, Michael Ching, called him a ``skinhead'' and ``racist,'' charges Ching
denied. According to the Sacramento Bee, the third-year point guard allegedly responded with the following: "Are you a fag?" "Are you gay?" "Do you remember the Vietnam War? I'll kill y'all just like that." Williams then pretended to be aiming a rifle and emitting a "rat-a-tat-tat" sound, according to witnesses. "Just like Pearl Harbor," he is said to have added.
This was the second time this season Williams has been fined for verbally lashing at fans. Kings' management said they won't tolerate any more outbursts by Williams.
While Williams apologized for his specific anti-Asian remarks, he couldn't bring himself to using the word ``gay.''
``I did not intend any disrespect to the Asian community or any other community," Williams said in a written statement. "I was wrong and I apologize."
In a weird coincidence, all three anti-gay outbursts occurred on the
28th of a month--Iverson (Jan. 28), Williams (Feb. 28) and Tavarez
(April 28).
Goran Ivanisevic We
cheered loudly for Ivanisevic as
he made his improbable journey from wild-card entrant to 2001
Wimbledon champ. We had tears in our eyes watching him embrace his
father in the stands after his magnificent five-set win over Patrick
Rafter in the men's final. Tears
turned to jeers after Ivanisevic
made some insulting homophobic remarks in his post-match press
conference. Here is part of the transcript from the press session:
Q. When you were broken at 4-2
in the fourth set, controversial point there, can you go over that
with us, what you thought should have happened?
IVANISEVIC: First of all, that
game, I was 30-Love up. I play some stupid shots. I make myself in
trouble. Then first foot fault. Hit great serve. He missed it. First
foot fault all tournament. That ugly, ugly lady, she was really
ugly, very serious, you know. I was like kind of scared.
``Then I hit another second serve,
huge. And that ball was on the line, was not even close. And that
guy, he looks like a faggot little bit, you know. This hair all over
him. He call it. I couldn't believe he did it.
``Just, you know, in two seconds, I
won point twice and I'm down 4-2. Then I got little crazy, you know.''
There's nothing crazy about what he
said, just offensive. What's worst is that ``faggot'' is apparently
Ivanisevic's slur of choice. This what the Times of London quoted
him as saying two weeks prior to Wimbledon:
Ivanisevic, now ranked No 124 in the world, only got into this
season’s main draw at Wimbledon by being given a wild card,
of which Britons will get 13 out of the 16 available in the singles.
However, he was not too downhearted. “Last year I played well here
and played like a faggot at Wimbledon,” Ivanisevic said. “Better
to play like a faggot here and play well at Wimbledon. Generally, I
have never played well at Queen’s and these days you can lose to
anyone if you don’t play well.”
His homophobia crossed the Atlantic
in a March
14 interview at Indian Wells in California:
Q. In
breaking a racquet, is it mostly in the wrist?
IVANISEVIC: Hey, sometimes I
watch the TV, and then I see the guys when they throw the racquets.
They throw it like a faggot, you know. They throw it not to throw
it. When you throw the racquet, you throw the racquet. I mean, you
break. Sometimes doesn't break, thanks God. But you throw the
racquet. You don't throw it and it's going like this. You have to
smack the racquet, you know, or you have to get anger.
Posted May 1, 2001
Updated July 10, 2001
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