500 words on Miller's Field in San Diego

Today's post violates my rules. It's a topic I submitted after an experience this weekend. I need to write this post because I feel there are few other things I can do. I hope this is cathartic. I hope you find it insightful.

I became a football fan a few years back, but it wasn’t until I freed up my Sundays this season that I really got to start following my team. It been a treat that we’ve had an undefeated season, and I wasn’t about to miss the game against the Redskins this past Sunday. Despite being in San Diego for a dive trip, I’d make it work. Fortunately my Saints often play early games and, as we were on the way to a 12-0 record, the game was being broadcast on Fox allowing me to watch most of the game before leaving the hotel.

As luck would have it, our diving on Sunday was cancelled. After a detour to pick up our dive gear, my dive buddies and I were able to grab the end of the game at a San Diego sports bar. We drove through Pacific Beach, surrounded by sports bar options and chose the first one to stand out: Miller’s Field. I ran from the car with 2 minutes left in a tied game and my friends parked the car.

There aren’t a lot of gay football fans, compared to say gay fans of oral sex, but there are plenty of us in just about any major metropolitan area. This season, I’ve caught most of the Saints games in your typical, straight male-dominated sports bars and always had a crazy fun time with straight strangers and friends enjoying the game. The one time I tried to check out LA’s new gay sports bar, GYM in West Hollywood, I learned quickly that it’s just a fetish bar that doesn’t take sports seriously. (It opens 2 hours after Sunday football starts.)

The manager at Miller’s Field in Pacific Beach, Ray Corallino, managed to do something that a divey Mo’s in Playa del Rey or the trendy Big Wangs in North Hollywood never came close to: he made me feel horribly unwelcomed, cheap, and threatened.

Corallino is apparently a Giants fan and as the Cowboys ran a play against the Giants, he stood behind the bar screaming, “Get him faggot. Get the faggot. Get the faggot. Faggot.” Please that the Cowboys fell to the Giants defense on that play, he followed his last screed with, “Yeah, Tony Homo. Take that Tony Homo. Stupid homo.”

My two (straight) friends immediately wanted to leave. I couldn’t because the Saints were in overtime, but I couldn’t believe what just happened. They were repulsed that a display like that could go down in crowded bar. I could believe it but never expected it.

I consider myself lucky. There’s really no point in pursuing this with Miller’s Field. After all, owner Glenn Miller hired this man as his lead manager and I’m not a local who would ever consider going back. I consider myself lucky because I’m surrounded every day by people that respect and love me, and I get to stand up an cheer loudly, proudly, and pretty friggin’ gaily for Saints of New Orleans.