Chris Culliver Was Asked Almost 100 Questions Today About His Anti-Gay-Teammate Comments

The past week in sports has been so gay! We've had Manti Te'o saying he's "far from" gay last Thursday; we've had Ronaiah Tuiasosopo claiming he's trying to recover from his gayness (good luck with that, champ); we've had that SI photo of the two 49ers fan-dudes making out at a gay bar; we've had an ex-49er being awkwardly outed after he allegedly beat the crap out of his boyfriend; and we've had Chris Culliver. Yesterday, he said his piece about gayness. It didn't really go over well. And Culliver met the press today, apologized, and said no, no, I'd be fine with a gay teammate.

"I treat everyone equal. That's not how I feel," he said.

Now, naturally, it's the Super Bowl, so there's plenty of press (more than 5,000 credentialed media folks are in New Orleans right now). But Culliver sat down for 45 minutes and was asked over 100 questions, nearly all of which were of the tsk-tsking variety, asking why he made the comments, how horrible he feels, and what he thinks now. All of this was really nicely documented by :

A sampling:

"Are you concerned that you'll be known as Chris Culliver, the guy who didn't want a gay teammate?" "Do you think that's how you will be known?" "How accepting would you be of a gay player?" (second time) "What would you like to say to the community of San Francisco?" (third time) "Have any gay or lesbian friends of yours had a conversation with you in the last 24 hours?" "In what ways did those conversations enlighten you?" "How prevalent is that attitude you expressed in the locker room? Is that a common sentiment?" "So do you know if you have a gay teammate?"

Also, there's this:

"Was your mother mad at you?" "Did she ask you why you said it?"

It's nice that we have gotten to the point that you are pretty heavily shamed if you say something like what he said. And, hey, look at that: Jered Weaver said today he is perfectly fine with it! The moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends toward athletes not saying shit that will require 45-minute apologies.

"Will this make you more cautious about what you say to people?" Replies Culliver: "It just makes me not want to do interviews."

[ USA Today]