Coming Out to Play, page 1
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First published in Penguin Books 2014
Copyright © 2014 by Robert H. Rogers
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“Leeds, Leeds, Leeds (Marching On Together)”
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Photograph credits
1, 2, 6, 7, 10, 11, 13, 14, 15, 16, 22: Courtesy of Theresa Rarick Rogers
3, 4, 5, 8, 9, 12: Courtesy of Robert H. Rogers Jr.
17: Charlotte Observer / McClatchy-Tribune / Getty Images
18, 24: Jeff Gross / Getty images Sport
19: Stephen Dunn / Getty Images Sport
20: Drew Hallowell / Getty Images Sport
21: Jamie Sabau / Getty Images Sport
23: Tom Jenkins / Getty Images Sport
25, 27: Courtesy of the author
26: Danielle Levitt / August
28: Victor Decolongon / Getty Images Sport
29: Jason Merritt / Getty Images Entertainment
30: Carlos Serrao
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
Rogers, Robbie.
Coming out to play / Robbie Rogers with Eric Marcus.
pages cm
ISBN 978-0-698-16805-3
1. Rogers, Robbie. 2. Soccer players—United States—Biography. 3. Gay athletes—United States—Biography. I. Marcus, Eric. II. Title.
GV942.7.R623A3 2014
796.334092—dc23
[B]
Penguin is committed to publishing works of quality and integrity. In that spirit, we are proud to offer this book to our readers; however, the story, the experiences, and the words are the author’s alone.
Version_1
For my family,
with so much love and appreciation
CONTENTS
TITLE PAGE
COPYRIGHT
DEDICATION
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
INTRODUCTION
1 CRACK-UP
2 MY TWIN
3 “BORDERLINE PRODIGY”
4 GOLDEN BOY IN A GOLDEN FAMILY
5 YOU’VE GOT TO BE CAREFULLY TAUGHT
6 COLLEGE MAN
7 A DREAM COME TRUE?
8 MY CHAMPIONSHIP SEASON
9 THE BIG LEAGUES
10 WILL THEY STILL LOVE ME?
11 FIRST TIME
12 THE TRUTH WILL SET YOU FREE
13 NOW WHAT?
14 BACK IN THE GAME
POSTSCRIPT: FEBRUARY 2014
PHOTOGRAPHS
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Although this book is a very personal effort, it required the help of many great people to make it all possible. First and foremost I would like to thank my family, including my beloved mother, Theresa Rarick Rogers; my devoted father, Robert H. Rogers, Jr.; my dear sisters, Alicia, Nicole, and Katie; and my loyal little brother (and favorite childhood playmate), Tim, for their love and support, and for opening up and sharing their personal stories.
Many thanks to my editor at Penguin Books, Patrick Nolan; Maxwell Reid, Patrick’s assistant; and Steve Ross, my agent, for taking such good care of this project from beginning to end and for making everything run so smoothly. (Thank you, Max, for coordinating all the photographs!) Special thank-yous to Nick Misani, who designed the book’s beautiful cover, to Lavina Lee, my eagle-eyed production editor, and to Bronwen Pardes, for masterfully transcribing the many hours of recorded interviews despite the fact that I talk so fast it’s sometimes hard for my own family to understand me.
Debra Ware, Business and Community Liaison Director for the Leeds United Football Club in the UK, went above and beyond to welcome my coauthor to Leeds and provide an open door to Leeds United facilities and staff. I will also be forever indebted to Will Martin at the Just Grand! Vintage Tearoom in Leeds, for coming up with the perfect title, Coming Out to Play.
Finally, I am beyond grateful to Greg Berlanti, for inspiring me in so many ways. And, last, thank you to Eric Marcus, for being such an amazing cowriter and becoming such a good friend over the course of working together on this book.
INTRODUCTION
My name is Robbie Rogers. My sister Alicia calls me “Robber,” but only when she’s being affectionate and wants to make me smile. Mom calls me “Robbie” or “Dearheart” and a lot of other embarrassing things. Grammers and Grandpa call me “Obbie Ogers,” not because they have a problem with their r’s but because I used to and they still like to think of me as their little grandson even though I long ago made peace with the entire alphabet. Most everyone else calls me Robbie.
Until recently I was best known as a professional soccer player who dabbled in fashion. (I have a men’s clothing line.) I’ve played soccer in one form or another for twenty-two of my twenty-six years and during that time I’ve done what I’ve had to in order to fit in and excel in the game I love.
My fans know that I played for the Columbus Crew in Ohio for five seasons, was voted All-Star, and was named to the MLS Best XI, one of the biggest honors for a player in Major League Soccer, when we won the 2008 MLS Cup. They also know that I played for the U.S. Olympic soccer team in the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics (one of the highlights of my life), that I left the United States in 2012 to play “football” in England for Leeds United, and in May 2013 joined the LA Galaxy.
What I’m best known for now is having “blazed a trail,” as NBA player Jason Collins said, when I returned to soccer after a very brief retirement and became the first openly gay male athlete to play in one of the top five team sports in North America.
Those are the bare outlines of my life. And while the various media have filled in some of the details since I came out publicly in February 2013, I’ve been uncomfortable with the shorthand versions of my life that I’ve seen and read. So in the pages that follow I’ll tell you the story of my life behind the headlines, how I lived with a secret that just about destroyed me, how I came to free myself from that secret, and how, despite all my fears to the contrary, I found the kind of acceptance, support, and love that I never believed was possible.
My hope is that by reading the story of my life in greater depth you will learn something from my experience. While I wouldn’t change anything about my life as I’ve lived it—because I wouldn’t be where I am today if not for all the experiences I’ve had, both good and bad—I wish I’d known the high price you inevitably pay when you choose to keep a secret that compels you to live a lie.
It’s a cliché to say that the truth will set you free. But as you’ll see, that’s exactly what happened to me. And it’s that wish to live an open and honest life that inspires me now to share my story with you.
Robbie Rogers
February 2014
CHAPTER 1
CRACK-UP
I was out cold before my face hit the ground.
February 18, 2012, should have been one of the happiest days of my life. Instead, I was crumpled in a heap on the stunningly green pitch (what they call a sports field in England), unconsciously breathing in the scent of freshly cut grass.
If I’d been able to hear anything—and I guarantee you that I wasn’t hearing a thing because my brain was still seeing stars—I could have heard a pin drop, because the twenty-one thousand soccer fans in the stands that sunny afternoon were holding their breath to see if the motionless American, who’d just made his debut at the historic Elland Road soccer stadium with their beloved Leeds United, was dead or alive.
Just the day before, I was as conscious as I’d ever been when I saw my name posted on the game-day roster at our training grounds for a match against the Doncaster Rovers. I can’t say I was surprised to see my name as much as I was relieved to finally have the chance to play after a month of training with my new team. Being placed on the game-day roster was no guarantee that I’d actually get to play, because I wasn’t in the starting eleven (the eleven “footballers” who are designated to start the game). But if you don’t get on the bench in the first place, there’s no chance you’ll be called in as a substitute.
It turned out to be a very dirty, ugly game—not much possession, not great passing—but even so, I enjoyed watching and just being there. The Leeds fans are very passionate. From the start of the game they’re always chan
Going into the second half the score was 0–0. There were five of us on the bench, and once the second half started the coach sent us to warm up at the side of the field, first two of us and then the other three. For a few minutes we jogged and stretched to get ready to possibly go in, and then went back to sit on the bench. And then I got called in.
You don’t have a lot of time between getting called and the start of play, but in the few seconds it took to get from the bench to my position on the pitch I thought, This is Leeds United. This is Elland Road. I’m playing football in England. I’m so proud and excited just being on this field where there’s so much history and so many great footballers have played.
Since I was a little boy kicking a ball up the steep driveway of the house where I grew up in Southern California, I’d dreamed of playing professional soccer in England. They have the biggest leagues and the most devoted fans, the game is always fast and competitive, and the greatest players want to go there. And now, having worked so hard to make this dream come true, I was running onto the pitch for an English team for the first time. If I was at all nervous in that moment it was only because I was making my debut and was eager to make a great first impression with the fans. I had no idea just how big an impression I’d make.
I was only in the game for eleven minutes when one of our defenders kicked the ball up in the air. As it was coming down I challenged for the ball in hopes of winning possession for our team. I could see I was in a good position to head it toward our striker or the opposing team’s goal. So I was backpedaling fast, thinking that I could connect with the ball and flick it off the back of my head. And at the same time, one of their defenders was racing flat-out from the opposite direction so he could flick the ball off the front of his head toward our goal. We both launched ourselves off the ground to meet the ball, but instead of connecting with the ball, my opponent head-butted me straight in the back of my head with the front of his—I was knocked out midair.
If anyone had known the real Robbie Rogers—and up to that point I’d made sure that no one did—they might have said it would take a blow to my head to get me to face facts about my life. But as I lay paralyzed on the field, fighting my way back to consciousness, all I could think was, Where am I and how did I get here? Good questions to consider in that brain-numbing moment—facedown in the grass, an ocean and a continent away from home.
CHAPTER 2
MY TWIN
I was a twin. I don’t know how I sensed it without anyone ever telling me, but one day when I was six or seven years old I asked my mother if I’d had a twin brother. But instead of telling you what my mom told me happened to my twin, I thought I’d let her tell the story because she was there:
We lived in San Pedro (which is part of Los Angeles) on Seventh Street in a little Spanish-style house right down the street from my office, where I had a legal practice. I was in the middle of a trial, but for some reason I needed to go to the house and either I’d forgotten my key or the key didn’t work. There was a side window that I’d always left open a crack, so I decided to climb in, not even thinking that it was a foolish thing to do considering that I was three months pregnant. The window was maybe four feet off the ground and I’m only five feet tall, so it was a bit of a struggle to get up to the window, and I slipped and fell.
It wasn’t until I had some spotting and bleeding later that day that I realized there might be a problem. So I called my doctor, John Roller, who was a dear friend. In fact, he’d delivered two of my mother’s children. He said, “You need to come in right now.” And I said, “I’m in trial, but I’ll come in after court today.” Sometimes I think about my behavior at that time and wonder, Was I nuts to wait? But I waited and once he examined me he told me I was having a miscarriage and that he wanted me to go to the hospital for a D&C (dilation and curettage, which is a procedure to remove any remaining tissue from the pregnancy). I said, “No, I can’t, I’m in trial.” As you might imagine, I was extremely upset and was probably in denial about what was happening to me and by focusing on the trial I didn’t have to think about losing my baby.
So the doctor said, “I’m going to give you a prescription that will at least slough off the majority of the lining of your uterus, and I want you to promise me you’ll get it and take this medication tonight.” I promised I would and I did. I don’t know how I managed in the days and weeks that followed, because I had just lost this child and went through a postpartum depression of sorts, but I dealt with the trial, and looked after my two young daughters, and kept going.
Approximately four months after this miscarriage, I was still feeling like I was pregnant and called John. He said that he thought I was just going through a difficult time after the miscarriage and needed more time to grieve the loss. But at five months I still had that feeling, so I called John again and said, “I know you think I’m crazy, but I think I’m pregnant.” He said, “Well, maybe you got pregnant again. Weirder things have happened.” So I went to see him and after examining me he said, “You are pregnant.” I said, “How far along?” And he said, “Five months!” I had no idea that I’d been pregnant with twins. In those days they didn’t do routine sonograms, which would have shown two heartbeats before the miscarriage and one after. So I remember thinking, Oh, my gosh, what if I’d had the D&C? I would have lost the second baby without even knowing it.
After telling me how incredible this was John got very pensive and said, “Because of the medication I prescribed for you the baby may have birth defects.” Both my doctor and I were Catholic, which is one of the reasons we were so close. He told me that he wouldn’t perform an abortion, but that I might consider consulting with another physician and discussing this option, which I never did. I told him, and I don’t think he was surprised, that I was “looking forward to having the baby and whatever gift the Lord gives me.”
Through the rest of my pregnancy I was extremely worried and I prayed, “Please Lord, you’ve given me this child, please take care of him and protect this little boy.” Then on Mother’s Day, May 12, 1987, Robbie was born. John was there to deliver him and he was overjoyed and pranced around the room with this child in his arms, and said, “He’s perfect! Everything about him is perfect!” And then Robbie urinated on him and John added, “Everything works!” Later, John told me that he’d kept a secret from me. He said, “The last time I delivered a baby on Mother’s Day, the child was very malformed and passed away, and I didn’t want to share that with you until after the birth.” No wonder John had been so relieved.
I never said a word to my children about Robbie’s twin, so I was shocked when Robbie asked me about his twin brother. He said, “I was a twin, wasn’t I?” I’d probably pushed the memory so far down that it took me a moment before I realized what Robbie was talking about. In a way, it was so eerie.
So that’s the story of my unnamed twin. But there was one other thing I told my mother when I first asked her about my brother. I said, “I know I had a brother and before he died, he gave me his speed.”
CHAPTER 3
“BORDERLINE PRODIGY”
I’ve always been known for my “explosive speed,” as any number of sports journalists have observed over the course of my career. But whether my ability to run fast comes from my twin brother, God, the universe, or just my genes, to me it was just me. So what I did on the soccer field came naturally and didn’t seem at all exceptional, although I was happy to put my apparent speed to good use against my opponents.
In later years, after I’d started playing professional soccer, reporters writing about my athletic skills helped provide me with some perspective on the gifts I’d been given and when they first became evident. For example, a 2008 article in the Columbus Dispatch newspaper said I’d been a “borderline prodigy in soccer and judo” since I was five. What the article didn’t note was that by the time I was five I’d already been kicking a soccer ball for two years and playing team soccer for one.
