NFL asks crooked questions looking for straight answers

Apparently it isn’t plodding 40-yard dashes, lagging vertical liftoff or questionable off-the-field decision-making that agitate the NFL Draft world these days.

It has seen poor times, gravity-challenged leaps and adolescent behavior aplenty. It has embraced players with criminal pasts, some before the ink was dry on their latest arrest reports.

What it hasn’t had is an openly gay player step into its cringing midst and get the ritual handshake and pat on the back from the commissioner on draft day.

Is that something that a league that presents itself as progressive and inclusive in so many other ways can handle?

You might wonder, given the tenor of questions some prospects said they have had to endure at the NFL Scouting Combine lately.

For example, Colorado tight end Nick Kasa told a Denver radio station, “They ask you like, ‘Do you have a girlfriend? Are you married? Do you like girls?’ Those kinds of things, and you know it was just kind of weird. But they would ask you with a straight face, and it’s a pretty weird experience altogether.” 

Michigan quarterback Denard Robinson said in a radio interview, “They (NFL teams) look into that stuff, I’m not going to lie to you, they do ask you that question: ‘Do you have a girlfriend? Are you married? Are you engaged?’ ”

And despite Manti Te’o’s unambiguous reply a month ago to TV interviewer Katie Couric’s question of whether he was gay — “No, far from it. F-a-r from it.” — questions apparently persist in the NFL, according to NBC Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio. He told the Dan Patrick radio show, “We have to step aside from the rest of reality and walk into the unique industry that is the NFL. Teams want to know whether Manti Te’o is gay. They just want to know. They want to know because in an NFL locker room, it’s a different world.”

Sadly so, because for one thing it is illegal for employers to ask. And, for another, it shouldn’t matter.

But history tells us in the NFL it has. Witness Chris Culliver’s pre-Super Bowl rant. Small wonder the gay players who have disclosed their orientation have done so only after leaving the league. Esera Tuaolo, a defensive tackle from Waimanalo, went public after a nine-year career, writing a book.

After the Kasa allegations, an NFL statement Wednesday said, “It is league policy to neither consider nor inquire about sexual orientation in the hiring process. In addition, there are specific protections in our collective bargaining agreement with the players that prohibit discrimination against any player, including on the basis of sexual orientation.” It said, “Any team or employee that inquires about impermissible subjects or makes an employment decision based upon such factors is subject to league discipline.”

Chicago Sun-Times columnist Rick Morrissey wrote, “I hope the Bears don’t pass on Te’o because they think he is gay. There are only two questions to answer: Does he have the potential to be a great player in the NFL and, if he is gay, can he handle the scrutiny that will come with it?”

And there is one more for the NFL: When the first openly gay player — whoever he is — arrives, can its teams cope with being brought into a more tolerant, enlightened age?

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Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@staradvertiser.com or 529-4820.