Billy Bean: not my lover
William Daro "Billy" Bean (born in Santa Ana, California) is a former Major League Baseball player who made news in 1999 when he made his homosexuality public
Born 11 May 1964 Bean was a high-scoring outfielder in a career that lasted from 1987 through 1995: Detroit Tigers 1987-89, Los Angeles Dodgers 1989, San Diego Padres 1993-95. Bean joined the Detroit Tigers in 1987 tying an MLB record with four hits in his first major league game
After acknowledging that he is gay, Bean went on to write a book, Going the Other Way: Lessons from a life in and out of Major League Baseball.Bean is only the second former major league player to reveal his homosexuality; the late Los Angeles Dodger and Oakland Athletic Glenn Burke is the only other ex-player to have acknowledged his homosexuality.He is also a current panelist on GSN's I've Got A Secret revival, and a board member of the Gay and Lesbian Athletics Foundation.
Billy Bean may be in the middle of a long and overscheduled book tour, with speaking engagement and signing parties crowding every free minute of the day, but it's not that hard to find a way to carve out some extra time for, say, a visit with a reporter.
Just ask if he wants to play some early morning tennis. He'll be up for it. At 38, Bean still has the earnest, boy-next-door look of an athlete fresh out of college, and when he talks about his love of sports, you can't help but feel a bit of longing for those little league glory days that may lurk in your own past
His competitive streak is just as apparent -- playing a few quick, games on Adams Morgan's public tennis courts, he plays every point as if it were a tournament. It's not necessarily about winning, but about playing the best he can, whatever and wherever the game may be.
When Bean left behind his life as a professional baseball player, he let go of a dream he had pursued since childhood. But his life as a closeted gay man had grown too stressful, and he could no longer balance the closet with the clubhouse. As a closeted player, he had divorced his wife and secretly moved in with his first lover, Sam. When Sam died of AIDS, Bean was so frightened of his secret being revealed that he didn't attend his lover's funeral.
"Why was it so impossible to think that a baseball player could grieve for a man?" he says. "I just didn't think I was worth enough to ask, and that sucked. That was a terrible, terrible decision I made."
Once out of the closet, Bean found himself in love with man who is now his partner, Efrain Veiga. And he found himself the center of attention in a gay and lesbian community looking for ways to break down the barriers of homophobia in sports. Bean is blunt about how strong that barrier remains -- he doesn't foresee any professional baseball player coming out and continuing to play in the near future, a view that has caused some critics to question his commitment to encouraging people to come out.
His new book, Going the Other Way, is in part an answer to that criticism -- while he hopes for gay players to eventually be as commonly accepted as any other, he also believes his experience shows what a hard road that will be for the one who chooses to take it. Even so, he says his goal is to deliver a positive message for gays and lesbians, and their friends and families.
"This book is not a sad story about a victim of homophobia, or baseball mistreating me," he says. "It's about what it's like to live in the closet and to try to realize a dream under those restrictions."
Born 11 May 1964 Bean was a high-scoring outfielder in a career that lasted from 1987 through 1995: Detroit Tigers 1987-89, Los Angeles Dodgers 1989, San Diego Padres 1993-95. Bean joined the Detroit Tigers in 1987 tying an MLB record with four hits in his first major league game
After acknowledging that he is gay, Bean went on to write a book, Going the Other Way: Lessons from a life in and out of Major League Baseball.Bean is only the second former major league player to reveal his homosexuality; the late Los Angeles Dodger and Oakland Athletic Glenn Burke is the only other ex-player to have acknowledged his homosexuality.He is also a current panelist on GSN's I've Got A Secret revival, and a board member of the Gay and Lesbian Athletics Foundation.
Billy Bean may be in the middle of a long and overscheduled book tour, with speaking engagement and signing parties crowding every free minute of the day, but it's not that hard to find a way to carve out some extra time for, say, a visit with a reporter.Just ask if he wants to play some early morning tennis. He'll be up for it. At 38, Bean still has the earnest, boy-next-door look of an athlete fresh out of college, and when he talks about his love of sports, you can't help but feel a bit of longing for those little league glory days that may lurk in your own past
His competitive streak is just as apparent -- playing a few quick, games on Adams Morgan's public tennis courts, he plays every point as if it were a tournament. It's not necessarily about winning, but about playing the best he can, whatever and wherever the game may be.
When Bean left behind his life as a professional baseball player, he let go of a dream he had pursued since childhood. But his life as a closeted gay man had grown too stressful, and he could no longer balance the closet with the clubhouse. As a closeted player, he had divorced his wife and secretly moved in with his first lover, Sam. When Sam died of AIDS, Bean was so frightened of his secret being revealed that he didn't attend his lover's funeral.
"Why was it so impossible to think that a baseball player could grieve for a man?" he says. "I just didn't think I was worth enough to ask, and that sucked. That was a terrible, terrible decision I made."
Once out of the closet, Bean found himself in love with man who is now his partner, Efrain Veiga. And he found himself the center of attention in a gay and lesbian community looking for ways to break down the barriers of homophobia in sports. Bean is blunt about how strong that barrier remains -- he doesn't foresee any professional baseball player coming out and continuing to play in the near future, a view that has caused some critics to question his commitment to encouraging people to come out.
His new book, Going the Other Way, is in part an answer to that criticism -- while he hopes for gay players to eventually be as commonly accepted as any other, he also believes his experience shows what a hard road that will be for the one who chooses to take it. Even so, he says his goal is to deliver a positive message for gays and lesbians, and their friends and families.
"This book is not a sad story about a victim of homophobia, or baseball mistreating me," he says. "It's about what it's like to live in the closet and to try to realize a dream under those restrictions."
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