The quiet understated heroism of baseball player Billy Bean

Billy Bean and Jim Provenzano. photo: Rick Gerharter

Only the second major league baseball player to come out after retirement, Billy Bean was a pioneer in a subtle way. He played for different teams, had ups and downs and a pivotal later success. Bean died of Leukemia on August 6, and is survived by his husband, Greg Baker.

What he's known for most recently is bringing Major League Baseball into the 21st century as an ambassador for diversity and inclusion in the league. What did Bean accomplish? 

According to The Advocate, 19 baseball players have come out in the past few years. If Bean helped that happen, let's give him credit. And only this week, The Boston Red Sox Jarren Duran was suspended for two games after shouting an antigay epithet to a fan. He later issued an apology.

Life-changing
"Billy Bean was never a star," wrote John Casey for The Advocate. "in fact, his career statistics, spread over six years with four different teams, were what one player would record in just half a season - if he’d last that long. Bean’s career batting average was a paltry .219, so theoretically, anyone hitting .219 for half a season would most likely be benched."

An All-American outfielder twice, Bean led Loyola Marymount to the College World Series in 1986, and retired at age 31. After the coming out news subsided, Bean actually shied away from doing the lecture circuit until he was convinced by Judy Shepherd to take advantage of that his moment.

So, when MLB asked him to become a Senior Vice President for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, Bean returned to the sport he loved, and developed and implemented initiatives aimed at promoting DEI within the sport.

Billy Bean flying to catch a ball in the outfield

Maura McGurk, writing eloquently for OverTheMonster, recalled that she was at the Mariners game on Tuesday night [August 6] "when they announced Bean's death before the game and paused for a moment of remembrance. They were playing the Tigers, Bean’s first team. With all our recent trade-deadline talk about prospects, here’s one to note: Bean was one of those coveted prospects who couldn’t make it in the big leagues. 

"His résumé and early successes promised great things, and he started to deliver right away. In his first game, he rapped out four hits, tying a record for a player in his first MLB debut. Detroit fell in love with him. But from those attention-getting beginnings, he made only 519 plate appearances in 272 total games, and retired at 31 years old.

A double
debut
After coming out in 1999, Bean made headlines in the media. His cover feature in a late December issue of The Advocate, coincidentally featured –on the last editorial page– the first major review for my debut novel PINS about about high school wrestlers.

At the same time, Sports Complex, my syndicated column for the Bay Area Reporter and other publications and websites included a different sport each week. Although I had already interviewed dozens of major LGBTQ athletes as well as hundreds of team members in amateur leagues, I tried to get an interview with Bean. 

But at the time, when someone comes out big time, there's a kind of hierarchy. The cover story in The Advocate was published, as well as an extensive feature in The New York Times, where Robert Lipsyte told of Bean's multiple struggles in the sports industry while being closeted, even while he was briefly married to a woman. 

In the first rush of publicity, Bean's handlers rejected initial interview requests from smaller newspapers. Snub moi? We were in the same issue of The Advocate. I was a bit put off and should've perhaps requested a later interview. But by the time his memoir came out, I was onto other non-sporty work. 

Billy Bean and David Kopay. photo: Rick Gerharter

Meet & greet
Lipsyte would later host a panel session (in 2000?) at the San Francisco Public Library with gay former football player David Kopay. I attended that and wrote about the event, and had interviewed Kopay. But what surprised both former sportsmen was when I offered a few baseballs for Billy to sign. Kopay also signed a football for me.

In a bit of foresight, I asked Bean to sign two baseballs. One I still own, and treasure. "I'll never sell it," I told him. He laughed. 

I forgot what else we discussed, but I'm happy that I was able to find the photos from the event with the help of photographer Rick Gerharter.

Anyway, balls. The other one I eventually donated to the GLBT Historical Society. It would five years before I would be asked to design and curate "Sporting Life," the first-ever LGBT sports exhibit, at the Society's former space in downtown San Francisco.

In that decade, I spent years writing about the LGBT sports community. It was never about statistics, as other writers like to ponder. It was about the people and how their lives were improved through playing sports and having fun. 

Bean's memoir, Going the Other Way, with accomplished journalist Chris Bull, was released in 2014. In it, he shared the anguish he experienced being in the closet, including having a boyfriend whom he could not introduce to friends or players. How far he'd come before passing.

So while I never got the in-depth interview I would've liked to get in those days, I'm proud to have met him a few times, and thanked him.

 

Posthumous praise continues, as in the MLB tribute (website video below). It's impossible to count how many younger LGBTQ athletes, also inspired by the 144 or so who competed at the Olympics in Paris, can find a place to see themselves on the field, in the pool, or in the game.

While perhaps not for his record on the field (which is still better than many), Bean's outreach and intelligent sensitivity training throughout the sport will be part of his legacy.