'Baseball still has the distinction of not having an active player come out.'

'Football, hockey, basketball, soccer - they've all had an active player who came out,' former American League umpire Dale Scott said during a recent phone interview with the Bay Area Reporter. The question MLB should have been asking is why is it still the one major American men's professional team sport that still has not had an active openly gay player? The lockout eventually ended, the jury is still out on how the rule changes will affect the game, and the NL finally caved and accepted the less intriguing world of pitchers whose only task in life is to throw the ball and sit around watching teammates actually play the game so long peddled by the American League. This year the headlines in Major League Baseball were about the lockout by the owners rule changes to restore the public interest, which has been flagging the past few generations and the long anticipated/feared acceptance of designated hitters in the National League.