When Liam Hendriks was talking to Major League Baseball teams in free agency — specifically the Chicago White Sox — he wanted to make sure of one thing.
No, it wasn’t more money or a longer term on his next contract. Hendriks wanted to be sure wherever he landed had a Pride Night. So when he was in talks with the White Sox in 2021, he inquired if they held one.
“It wasn’t a demand. It was a simple question of, ‘Do you guys have a Pride Night?’ And if you don’t, that will be something that we need to look into that working out, making sure that we can handle it, because I don’t want to go necessarily to a team that doesn’t do it,” Hendriks told The Athletic’s James Fegan.
The White Sox made Pride Night an annual event in 2018 and the third official Pride Night will take place June 23.
Hendriks took part in last season’s Pride Night by raising the Pride flag and said he received “horrendous” direct messages on social media. The pitcher hopes these nights start “more of a trend,” but until it does, Hendriks is happy to be a voice and use his platform for those who don’t have the reach he does.
“It’s something that I’ve believed in,” Hendriks told The Athletic. “The biggest thing is making sure that hopefully it starts more of a trend of other people willing to do it. And then the more people that are willing to do it, the more people are willing to come out publicly and say, ‘I’m fine with this. And I’m hoping it strengthens the resolve of those people who may be on the fence about coming out, that may be on the fence of telling family, friends, peers or teammates or anything like that and fully embrace that.”
Hendriks’ support for Pride Night and the LGBTQIA+ community comes just days after members of the Tampa Bay Rays opted out of wearing the Pride logo for their Pride Night earlier this month. Jason Adam addressed the situation saying, via ESPN, that “maybe we don’t want to encourage it if we believe in Jesus, who’s encouraged us to live a lifestyle that would abstain from that behavior.”
At the end of the day, Hendriks knows not everyone will get along, but is hopeful that more conversations will lead to a better place.
“For me, it’s just being a decent human being,” Hendriks told The Athletic. “You are going to have people you just don’t get along with purely based on personality, but race, sexual orientation or anything like that should never come into it. They should never be part of the equation of why you have a disdain for somebody, and that’s something that I think the more people talk about, hopefully it gets more normalized.”
Aside from the White Sox’s Pride Night, Hendriks also will be able to take part in the one held by the Los Angeles Angels on June 28.
