Several NFL executives believe the league is ready to embrace its first openly gay player.
After playing for the Falcons coaching staff on the North team for the Senior Bowl in Mobile, Ala., last month, Missouri defensive end Michael Sam announced recently that he was a gay.
He projects to be drafted anywhere from the third to the fifth round in the NFL draft, scheduled for May 8-10.
All 32 teams are gathered here for the annual scouting combine, which essentially is a job interview and workout process for the nation’s top draft-eligible players.
Whenever Sam’s name was mentioned to several team executives, most were more concerned about Sam’s pass-rush and pass-coverage skills.
“For us, if he’s competitive and committed to working hard, that’s all that we care about,” Jacksonville general manager David Caldwell said. “It’s been 17 or 18 years that I’ve been in the NFL, and the sexual orientation of a player has never come up once in the discussion. I don’t think it should ever come up again, honestly.”
Tennessee Titans coach Ken Whisenhunt, a former Falcons player (1985-88) who played at Georgia Tech, also was clearly focused on Sam’s skill-set.
“If you’re co-defensive player of the year in the SEC, you have to be a pretty good football player,” Whisenhunt said.
Falcons coach Mike Smith got to know Sam over the Senior Bowl week.
“First and foremost, when you evaluate a football player, you evaluate them on what you see on the field,” Smith said. “A player’s personal life is not something that you concern yourself with. You are evaluating the player.”
The Falcons worked out Sam as a defensive end and a linebacker at the Senior Bowl.
“We got an opportunity to see him do both positions,” Smith said. “He was much more comfortable playing the defensive end position, but there are a number of teams that project him as an outside linebacker.
“I know that he is more comfortable with playing with his hand in the dirt. We, as a coaching staff, moved him (between) defensive end and outside linebacker in that game simply because we knew the entire league wanted to evaluate him as an (outside linebacker) or a defensive end.”
Smith shared his view of the locker-room atmosphere in the NFL — Miami’s situation notwithstanding — and how Sam might fit.
“The locker room, I believe this, you win in the locker room,” Smith said. “Every locker room has to have the element of respect. You have to respect one another. It’s all about winning. … If a guy can come in and help us win football games, that’s all we can concern ourselves with.”
Smith said the locker room is an important part of the Falcons’ experience.
“I know this, our locker room is built on respect and respect for one another,” Smith said. “That’s the most important thing. I think that you (must) have mentors throughout the locker room.
“It’s not just the players’ locker room. It’s the organization’s locker room. There are lot of people that interact in the locker room besides the players in Atlanta. You have the equipment staff, the training staff, the (media-relations) staff and the coaching staff.”
Jacksonville coached the South team in the Senior Bowl, and Caldwell was present all week for practices and the game.
“As a football player, he’s highly competitive,” Caldwell said. “He played really hard. He went through the whole week really good. As far as the later announcement, it’s not really an issue for us. As a player, he’s a good player and has good pass-rush skills.”
Caldwell believes that Sam would fit in the Jaguars’ locker room.
“Not even worried about that,” Caldwell said. “Not worried about that at all. We’re very respective of our culture, and there is no reason why he wouldn’t fit into our culture.”
Sam may slip in the draft, but not because of his sexual orientation.
“He’s a ’tweener, and I think that’s why people are having trouble with the evaluation,” NFL Network draft analyst Mike Mayock said. “I saw some Missouri tape and then again at the Senior Bowl. What I saw was a guy that’s a natural edge-rush guy.
“He’s much better going forward than he is going backwards. He’s got a little bit of an explosion off the edge, but he doesn’t have the length. He’s got linebacker size, but he’s got the physical skill-set of a defensive end. He’s a tough fit.”
While some groups have protested Sam’s announcement on religious grounds, former Falcons great Tony Gonzalez believes he’ll have widespread support.
“What an unbelievable and courageous kid that he is to be able to come out and do that at this point,” Gonzalez said. “He could have played it safe and say I’m going to go to the league and maybe come out once I get established, but he did it right at the beginning. That takes courage.”
Gonzalez expects some resistance.
“Only a small minority of players are going to have a problem with this,” said Gonzalez, who joined CBS Sports as a TV analyst on Tuesday. “That goes without saying. That’s human nature. But those players better accept it and get used to it because it’s coming no matter what. I don’t think it will be that big of a problem.”
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