Golden State Warriors Hiring of Rick Welts Is No Big Deal

Late Monday the Golden State Warriors announced the hiring of Rick Welts as team president and chief operating officer as part of the franchise's on-going makeover under new owners Joe Lacob and Peter Guber.

Welts comes to the Bay Area with four decades of NBA experience, having spent nearly half his career in the NBA front office working with David Stern and has been with the Phoenix Suns since 2002.

Ordinarily that would be the end of the story; However, this past May Welts made news by coming out publicly.    

Since that time Welts has gone from being a relatively obscure NBA executive to a trail blazer.  Yet once the initial news passed within the 24/7 news cycle, little more seemed to be said of the move in sporting circles.  It was only a few weeks ago that Welts' name surfaced again in announcing his departure from the Suns with the hopes of achieving a better balance between his personal and professional life.

Even though Welts offered assurances in stating, "It really is completely a personal situation," this move and it's somewhat abrupt nature seemed worthy of concern. 

Yet here we are just a few weeks later seeing Welts with the Warriors being given full support from the team's new ownership in addition to the backing of his former bosses. 

“Whether he’s gay or straight is irrelevant,” Lacob said. “I want the best executive possible. All I care about is winning, and we’re going to get there. I promise you, we’re going to get there. He took a huge risk. It’s a pretty impressive thing he did in the world of sports.”

Perhaps the story here is that there is no story. 

Even Welts himself would seem to agree...

“I think nobody gives a crap, for the most part,” he said when asked if he might be breaking down barriers. “For whatever reason, again, in men’s team sports we just have a hard time discussing it. I think the more we talk about it, the more comfortable we can be with it and the less, perhaps, threatening and scary it seems to those who are on any side of the issue.”

Moving forward, Welts will continue to deal with the issues facing him and his coming out, but more importantly the day-to-day operations of the Warriors.  One can only hope that given this opportunity, Welts will now be able to find both personal and professional fulfillment. 

Ultimately isn't that what we all want in life?   A chance to be happy in doing something we enjoy and having time to share with the people we love?

Perhaps that is the real story...