This morning Ohio State CB Eli Apple, who’s projected to go mid-first round in next month’s draft, appeared on Comcast SportsNet in Philadelphia and revealed the strangest question he’d been asked at the NFL scouting combine. Turns out, the strangest question he got was also the first.
“The Falcons coach, one of the coaches, was like, ‘So do you like men?’ It was like the first thing he asked me. It was weird. I was just like, ‘no.’ He was like, ‘if you’re going to come to Atlanta, sometimes that’s how it is around here, you’re going to have to get used to it.’ I guess he was joking but they just ask most of these questions to see how you’re going to react.”
The Falcons will probably get in a little bit of trouble for this, even if the coach was joking, because you can’t do that. Two years ago the NFL reminded its clubs in a memo that questions about sexual orientation are against league policy as well as employment discrimination laws.
The Falcons quickly put out a statement from head coach Dan Quinn. Via CSN Philly:
“I am really disappointed in the question that was asked by one of our coaches. I have spoken to the coach that interviewed Eli Apple and explained to him how inappropriate and unprofessional this was. I have reiterated this to the entire coaching staff and I want to apologize to Eli for this even coming up. This is not what the Atlanta Falcons are about and it is not how we are going to conduct ourselves.”
Contact the author at barryp@deadspin.com.
