OUTSPORTS: The Site for Gay Sports Fans and Athletes

Updated: March 15, 2000
TOP OF THE WEEK
THE DANCE CARD IS FILLED OUT

    The NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament is called the Big Dance since it fields 64 teams. Like any dance you have the popular ones that everyone want a piece of and your wallflowers.
     The former include such perennials as Duke, Kentucky and Arizona, teams not happy unless they win a championship.
     The latter features teams such as Hofstra and Central Connecticut, the equivalent of the Plain Jane who's just thrilled to be asked to the dance.
     On the women's side the royalty prevails as perennial contenders Louisiana Tech, Connecticut, Tennessee and Georgia have the top seeds.

BOTTOM OF THE WEEK
BILLY PACKER
        Billy Packer, CBS' men's college basketball analyst, showed the world what a sexist pig he is.
       Packer, not wearing a press pass, was stopped recently from entering Duke's arena by two female attendants and asked for ID.
      "You need to get a life," Packer said, according to USA Today. "Since when do we let women control who gets into a men's basketball game? Why don't you go find a women's game to let people into?"
        Packer later apologized. .

NFL
     A 38-year-old unmarried Mormon is as rare as snow in Santa Monica and for years gay football fans everywhere wondered about San Francisco QB Steve Young. Was he one of us?
     Well, Young got married this week in Hawaii to fellow Mormon Barbara Graham.
    ‘‘There’s always been extra scrutiny on Steve and his romantic life,’’ his agent, Leigh Steinberg, told the San Francisco Chronicle. ‘‘He’s arguably the best known Mormon figure in the world. There has been enormous pressure on him.’’
      Steinberg is a master at getting maximum PR for the romantic involvements of his clients under such ``scrutiny.''
     In a famous example a few years ago Sports Illustrated ran a long piece on Troy Aikman's search for the perfect woman, a story that had Steinberg's fingerprints all over it. We also discovered that Aikman spent a lot of time in AOL chat rooms, though the article never specified which ones. This came at a time of very public discussions in Dallas about Aikman's sexuality (a subject raised in a book by columnist Skip Bayless and echoed by Aikman's coach Barry Switzer).
     Another lust object of fans also tied the knot in a very public way this week.
New York Giants cornerback Jason Sehorn, he with the looks and body of a circuit boy, came on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno and proposed to actress Angie Harmon. She said yes.     '

NBA
    Dennis Rodman will have plenty of time to cross-dress, fight with his wife and hit gay bars everywhere after being cut by the Dallas Mavs.
     His offense? He pissed off owner Mark Cuban, a rich kid who likes to play with his new toy.
     ``Mark Cuban wants to win, but he's an owner, not a player,'' Rodman said. "He doesn't need to be hanging around the players like he's a coach or something. That's like Jerry Jones, and it's dumb. That's why the Cowboys went down. He needs to be the owner, step back and put people in who can get this team in the right direction.''
    A reader from Dallas told us: ``Rodman spent way too much time at the local bars:
JR's, Village Station and The Brick.
    Here in Dallas, rumors have it (just talk now!). that the owner, 40 year old, single, good looking, rich 'cheerleader' owner, Mark Cuban was with him on a
couple of those nights! But we don't care who frequents our pubs and who has lover's
spats!"
     On a sadder NBA note, Tom Gugliotta, one of the hottest guys in the league, will need at least a year of rehab after blowing out his knee last week. He was always a pleasure to watch, with or without the ball.

BASEBALL
    From our Dirty Old Men Will Be Dirty Old Men Department:
The appropriately named Dick Williams, 70, spent a night in jail after accused of walking naked and masturbating outside his hotel room in Fort Myers, Fla. in January.
    Williams, one of the great managers of his time (his Oakland A's won two World Series in the '70s) admits to being nude, but not to the jerking off charge.
‘‘I’m stupid and guilty of being nude in the doorway,’’ Williams told the Associated Press this week. ‘‘But I was not masturbating. That part is simply not true and I want
people to know it.’’
    ‘‘I was looking out for a few seconds before dressing for bed,’’ he said. ‘‘But I was not doing anything else. I was not walking around on a balcony, I had no intention of being seen. That is totally ridiculous.’’
     First Pee Wee Herman, now Dick Williams. Are no icons sacred?

GOLF
   Five seconds cost Brian Gay $88,000.
    Gay, golfing Sunday in the Honda Classic in Florida, thought he had forged a tie after 17 holes of the final round when his putt finally fell in the hole after sitting on the edge of the cup for an amazing 15 seconds.
    But an obscure rule states that after 10 seconds the ball is considered dead where it lies. Gay was penalized a stroke and that dropped him on the leaderboard and cost him $88,993.
    Funny, we know gays who can get off in faster than 15 seconds.
    On the women's tour, Karrie Webb continues to amaze.
    The 25-year-old, the first rookie to ever win $1 million in a season, is going for her fourth straight tour win this week, which would tie a record set by the great Nancy Lopez in 1978.
    But Webb is only know starting to get attention.
    ``Karrie has done as well or better than Tiger (Woods),'' Hall of Famer Juli Inkster told the Associated Press. ``She just doesn't have the TV support or media to have
what Tiger has.'' .