The Outsports.com Web site also said Amaechi had a "regular boyfriend for a time in England" after having played for the Cavaliers and for three years in Europe. But when he returned to the NBA in 1999, the Internet account said, Amaechi "was celibate until he went to the Jazz." A guaranteed Jazz contract, it said, "set his mind at ease, and it was there that he began venturing out to gay establishments and building a mostly gay circle of friends."

The Web site said Amaechi writes of his first sexual experiences in the United States and "how the Utah Jazz and Salt Lake City, controlled by the Latter Day Saints, was an odd backdrop for what felt like his coming out party."

It also quotes him as saying he was "practically daring reporters to take the bait and out me, but it never happened."

Jazz beat writers Tim Buckley of the Deseret Morning News and Phil Miller of The Salt Lake Tribune said Wednesday they didn't notice Amaechi trying to bait them. He did not openly ask them to report such news. It was fairly common knowledge within the team about what Amaechi terms his "open secret."

Only a few male professional athletes in major American sports have announced publicly that they are gay. Pro football player David Kopay did so in 1977, followed more recently by former NFL linemen Esera Tualo and Roy Simmons. Also, baseball players Billy Bean and Glenn Burke and baseball umpire Dave Pallone. WNBA player Sheryl Swoopes made such an announcement, with Bragman's help, in October 2005.

Amaechi's was born in Massachusetts. His Nigerian father was not in his life, and he was reared in England by his single mother, a doctor. He returned to the U.S. for a final year of high school and spent a year at Vanderbilt before transferring to Penn State.

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E-mail: lham@desnews.com