John Amaechi

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John Amaechi
Boston, Massachusetts
, U.S.
NationalityBritish / American / Nigerian
Listed height6 ft 10 in (2.08 m)
Listed weight270 lb (122 kg)
Career information
High school
College
CSP Limoges
19992001Orlando Magic
20012003Utah Jazz
Career highlights and awards
Career NBA statistics
Points
1,837 (6.2 ppg)
Rebounds772 (2.6 rpg)
Assists228 (0.8 apg)
Stats Edit this at Wikidata at NBA.com
Stats Edit this at Wikidata at Basketball-Reference.com
Medals
Men's basketball
Commonwealth Games
Representing  England
Bronze medal – third place 2006 Melbourne Men's basketball

John Uzoma Ekwugha Amaechi

Penn State, and professional basketball in the National Basketball Association
(NBA). Amaechi also played in France, Greece, Italy, and the United Kingdom. Since retiring from basketball, Amaechi has worked as a psychologist and consultant, establishing his company Amaechi Performance Systems.

In February 2007, Amaechi became the first former NBA player to publicly come out as gay after doing so in his memoir Man in the Middle.[1] Since then, he has been regarded as "one of the world's most high-profile gay athletes".[2]

Early life

Amaechi was born in

St. John's Jesuit High School in Toledo, Ohio. He began playing college basketball at Vanderbilt but transferred to Penn State
, where he was a two-time First Team Academic All-American selection. While at Penn State, Amaechi became a motivational public speaker and a mentor for area youth.

Basketball career

The 6 ft 10 in (2.08 m), 270 pounds (120 kg)

Virtus Bologna but left mid-season.[citation needed
]

He returned to the NBA, signing with the Orlando Magic in 1999. In the 1999–2000 season he averaged 10.5 points in 21.1 minutes per game. Amaechi was known for turning down a $17 million contract offer from the Los Angeles Lakers in 2000, opting to remain in Orlando for $600,000 per year.[5] Amaechi went on to play for the Utah Jazz from 2001 to 2003.

He was traded to the Houston Rockets before the 2003–04 season in exchange for Glen Rice,[6] and, though he was an active player, he did not participate in any games for them. The Rockets later traded him and Moochie Norris to the New York Knicks for Clarence Weatherspoon before the Knicks bought him out of his contract and he eventually retired from playing the sport altogether.[7]

Career statistics

Legend
  GP Games played   GS  Games started  MPG  Minutes per game
 FG%  Field goal percentage  3P%  3-point field goal percentage  FT%  Free throw percentage
 RPG  Rebounds per game  APG  Assists per game  SPG  Steals per game
 BPG  Blocks per game  PPG  Points per game  Bold  Career high

EuroLeague

Year Team GP GS MPG FG% 3P% FT% RPG APG SPG BPG PPG PIR
1996–97
Panathinaikos
16 24.9 .549 .677 5.8 .5 1.1 .0 11.0
1997–98
Virtus Bologna
6 14.2 .542 .647 3.8 .5 .3 .0 6.2
Career 22 19.6 .546 .662 4.8 .5 .7 .0 8.6

NBA

Regular season

Year Team GP GS MPG FG% 3P% FT% RPG APG SPG BPG PPG
1995–96 Cleveland 28 3 12.8 .414 .576 1.9 .3 .2 .4 2.8
1999–00 Orlando 80 53 21.1 .437 .167 .766 3.3 1.2 .4 .5 10.5
2000–01 Orlando 82 36 20.9 .400 .000 .631 3.3 .9 .3 .4 7.9
2001–02 Utah 54 0 10.9 .325 .638 2.0 .5 .1 .2 3.2
2002–03 Utah 50 1 9.5 .314 .481 1.5 .4 .3 .1 2.0
Career 294 93 16.4 .403 .077 .671 2.6 .8 .3 .3 6.2

Playoffs

Year Team GP GS MPG FG% 3P% FT% RPG APG SPG BPG PPG
1996 Cleveland 1 0 2.0 .000 .0 .0 .0 .0 .0
2001 Orlando 4 0 7.3 .375 .750 .8 .8 .8 .5 2.3
2003 Utah 2 0 8.0 .250 .500 .5 .0 .0 .0 2.0
Career 7 0 6.7 .308 .625 .6 .4 .4 .3 1.9

Career after basketball

Amaechi speaking in May 2009

Amaechi came out of retirement to represent England during the 2006 Commonwealth Games in Melbourne, helping the England team win the bronze medal. In all, Amaechi appeared in 18 games for England.[8]

He has worked in the media, particularly as a commentator on basketball for British TV shows covering the NBA, and for the BBC during Olympic games. In addition, Amaechi was a judge on the BBC Series The Speaker in 2009.[9] He has also been a regular guest host of the BBC Radio Manchester Business show with Steven Saul[10] and has appeared on The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz on ESPN Radio as a guest and guest co-host.

Amaechi owns Amaechi Performance Systems, which is a consultancy working with numerous companies to improve leadership and communication skills and organisational diversity.[11]

Amaechi is a member of the American Psychological Association,[12] the British Psychological Society (BPS),[13] the BPS Division of Organisational Psychology and the BPS Psychological Testing Centre.[14] Amaechi also became a Senior Fellow at the centre for Emotional Literacy and Personal Development at the University of Central Lancashire (UCLAN) in the United Kingdom.[15]

Amaechi is also involved with the ABC Foundation in

English Basketball League's Manchester Magic (men) and Manchester Mystics
(women), both of which are owned by Amaechi.

In a radio interview, Amaechi said that he was returning to school to get a PhD in psychology. "I want to do something more meaningful in my life," he said. Amaechi also explained why he played for Orlando in 2000 for much less than the $17 million offered to him by the Lakers; his answer was that Orlando had signed him in 1999 when no other team would. "There are many people who are asked what their word is worth, and when people ask me that I can say, 'At least $17 million.'"[17]

Coming out

In February 2007, Amaechi spoke about his

closeted professional athlete. Amaechi is the first National Basketball Association (NBA) player to speak publicly about being gay.[18][19]

Few male team sports players in the United States have come out as gay. Former Major League Baseball player Billy Bean wrote an op-ed in support of Amaechi's decision.[20][21]

Outsports.com, a website dedicated to the gay contribution to sports, said, "I don't think (Amaechi's declaration) will have any effect on his ability to do that," referring to Amaechi's businesses and charitable work. "You will have some people who will raise an eyebrow," Zeigler added.[22]

In a 2002 interview with Scotland on Sunday, Amaechi had previously spoken about gays in the NBA: "If you look at our league, minorities aren't very well represented. There's hardly any Hispanic players, no Asian-Americans, so that there's no openly gay players is no real surprise. It would be like an alien dropping down from space. There'd be fear, then panic: they just wouldn't know how to handle it."[23]

In May 2007, a few months after coming out, Amaechi said he had "underestimated America", adding that he had expected the "wrath of a nation" but it never materialised.[24] He made these statements despite having been the subject of death threats a few months earlier.[25]

In August 2008, Amaechi was sent to Beijing to do Olympic Men's and Women's Basketball broadcasts and reporting for the BBC. There, he wrote a blog with fellow activist and photographer Jeff Sheng in partnership with Amnesty International. He used Sheng's knowledge of Mandarin and experience in Beijing to get behind the scenes and gather candid interviews with locals and Olympic athletes alike.[26]

In 2008, Amaechi made several appearances on

LOGO Television. He acted as team "mentor" and "psychologist" to the San Francisco Rockdogs, a gay basketball team, and shared his experiences on basketball, life, and coming out.[27] In 2010, Amaechi made public that he had been denied entry to a gay bar in Manchester, allegedly because the doorman felt he was "big, black and could be trouble". He said he was considering legal action.[28]

Reaction from other players

One widely publicized response to Amaechi's announcement came from former NBA player Tim Hardaway, who stated that he would demand that a gay player be removed from his team: "First of all I wouldn't want him on my team. Second of all, if he was on my team I would really distance myself from him because I don't think that's right and I don't think he should be in the locker room when we're in the locker room. Something has to give. If you have 12 other ball players in your locker room that's upset and can't concentrate and always worried about him in the locker room or on the court or whatever, it's going to be hard for your teammates to win and accept him as a teammate."[29] Hardaway later apologised for his remarks.

Some players gave Amaechi public support: former

New York Daily News, "If he was on my team, I guess I would have to protect him from the outsiders, I'm not homophobic or anything. I'm not the type who judges people, I wish him well."[30] Charles Barkley said: "It shouldn't be a big deal to anybody. I know I've played with gay players and against gay players and it just shouldn't surprise anybody or be any issue."[30]

However, the prevailing public statements from NBA players tended toward an expression of mixed feelings on the matter. Steven Hunter said that he would accept an openly gay teammate "as long as he [didn't] make any advances toward me. As long as he came to play basketball like a man and conducted himself like a good person, I'd be fine with it." That sentiment was echoed, though less tactfully,[31] by Shavlik Randolph, who said that "as long as you don't bring your gayness on me I'm fine. As far as business-wise, I'm sure I could play with him. But I think it would create a little awkwardness in the locker room."[32] Pat Garrity warned that an openly gay player could expect to face both acceptance and hostility from his teammates. He said that "they would have teammates that would accept them for being a good person and a good teammate, and there would be people who would give him a hard time about it. I think that's true if you're playing basketball or in an office job. That's just how the world is right now." LeBron James said, "With teammates you have to be trustworthy, and if you're gay and you're not admitting that you are, then you are not trustworthy. So that's like the No. 1 thing as teammates – we all trust each other.... It's a trust factor, honestly. A big trust factor."[32]

Awards

Amaechi was awarded an Honorary Degree of Doctor of Science by Manchester Metropolitan University on 19 July 2007 in recognition of his achievements not only as an athlete and broadcaster, but also for his charitable work with the National Literacy Trust, the

National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC) and the establishment of the ABC Foundation to encourage children to become involved in sport and their community.[33]

Amaechi was appointed

Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2011 Birthday Honours for services to sport and the voluntary sector.[34][35] He was also conferred with an Honorary Doctorate of Arts by the University of East London.[36]

Bibliography

References

  1. ^ Woods, Mark (18 February 2007). "Coming out fighting off basketball court". Scotland on Sunday. Edinburgh, UK. Archived from the original on 22 July 2009. Retrieved 31 July 2009.
  2. ^ "Fifa boss Sepp Blatter sorry for Qatar 'gay' remarks". BBC Sport. London. 17 December 2010.
  3. ^ a b Jackson, Jamie (4 March 2007). "Why I've come out". Observer Sport Monthly. London. Retrieved 25 January 2009.
  4. ^ "THE INSIDE STORY OF UNITED'S 1980S BASKETBALL TEAM". ManUtd.com. Retrieved 14 August 2023.
  5. ^ Le Batard, Dan (26 February 2007). "Free to be himself". ESPN The Magazine.
  6. ^ "Rockets trade forward Glen Rice for Utah center John Amaechi". ESPN. 30 September 2003.
  7. ^ Whittell, Ian (1 January 2004). "Basketball: Fading Amaechi cashes in". The Telegraph. Retrieved 2 May 2013.
  8. ^ "Why I've come out". The Guardian. 4 March 2007. Retrieved 4 March 2022.
  9. ^ "BBC – The Speaker – John Amaechi". Retrieved 24 October 2013.
  10. ^ "Manchester Business 23 Nov 2010". BBC. 13 August 2012. Retrieved 2 May 2013.
  11. ^ "Amaechi Performance – About". Retrieved 24 October 2013.
  12. ^ [1] Archived 20 November 2010 at the Wayback Machine
  13. ^ Public Registration number 222511
  14. The British Psychological Society
    . Retrieved 24 October 2013.
  15. ^ Dr Stephen John Wintersgill, IP Manager, Knowledge Transfer, UCLAN, Preston Lancs, PR1 2HE
  16. ^ Woods, Mark (August 2002). "Amaechi largesse leaves centre in wake". Britball.com.
  17. ^ "Gay in the NBA". The Brian Lehrer Show. New York: WNYC. 20 February 2007. Archived from the original on 25 February 2007.
  18. ^ Zeigler Jr., Cyd; Buzinski, Jim (7 February 2007). "John Amaechi to come out publicly". Outsports.com. Archived from the original on 9 February 2007.
  19. ^ Whittell, Ian (7 February 2007). "I'm gay, says British basketball star: John Amaechi is first male basketball player to come out in US". The Times. London.
  20. ^ Bean, Billy (8 February 2007). "BEAN: One Pioneering Gay Athlete Thanks Another". ABC News.
  21. ^ Collins, Jason; Lidz, Franz. "NBA player Jason Collins says he is gay". Sports Illustrated. Retrieved 29 April 2013.
  22. ^ Henderson, William (8 February 2007). "Former NBA player and Boston native comes out". In Newsweekly. Archived from the original on 28 September 2007.
  23. ^ Woods, Mark (18 August 2002). "Gay expression continues to struggle". Scotland on Sunday. Edinburgh.
  24. ^ Stapleton, Arnie (5 May 2007). "Amaechi: 'I underestimated America'". Yahoo Sports. Associated Press. Archived from the original on 8 May 2007.
  25. ^ "Amaechi 'receives death threats'". The Australian. Sydney. AFP. 14 February 2007.
  26. ^ Beijing Legacy Blog.
  27. ^ "Skins & Skins: Episode 2". Downelink.com. 22 September 2008. Archived from the original on 29 October 2013. Retrieved 2 May 2013.
  28. ^ "NBA star John Amaechi in bar access row". BBC News Online. London. 13 September 2010.
  29. ^ "Straight shooter: 'Homophobic' Hardaway says he hates 'gay people'". CNN Sports Illustrated. Associated Press. 14 February 2007. Archived from the original on 19 February 2007.
  30. ^ a b "Some reactions to John Amaechi's coming out". Interbasket.net. Retrieved 2 May 2013.
  31. ^ Wilbon, Michael (9 February 2007). "Sexuality Disclosed, Ignorance Exposed". The Washington Post.
  32. ^ a b Sheridan, Chris (9 February 2007). "Amaechi becomes first NBA player to come out". ESPN].
  33. ^ "Commonwealth Games hero awarded", Faculty News – News & Events – MMU Cheshire, 19 July 2007.
  34. ^ "No. 59808". The London Gazette (Supplement). 11 June 2011. p. 9.
  35. ^ "BBC News – Queen's Birthday Honours". 11 June 2011. Retrieved 11 June 2011.
  36. ^ "Former NBA basketball player, John Amaechi, holds court at East London graduation ceremony". University of East London. Retrieved 16 January 2012.

External links