Gay NBA referee Bill Kennedy keeps entertaining fans during replay challenges

There were a lot of stars on the floor during the Los Angeles Lakers and Utah Jazz game on Tuesday night. That included referee Bill Kennedy.

Luka Doncic had 37 points and 10 assists. LeBron James made his 23rd NBA season debut with 12 assists.

And yet, the flashiest performer of the night was somebody who wasn’t even playing in the Lakers’ 140-126 victory.

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During a replay review in which the referees were deciding whether there was a foul on a play involving Doncic, official Bill Kennedy took center stage and didn’t want the camera on anyone else.

Doncic tried to talk to Kennedy about the call again right before the officials were about to make an announcement on the play, a decision that Kennedy didn’t take kindly to.

The veteran referee shooed the Slovenian star off the sideline so that he could run the show.

That’s when the magic unfolded.

Kennedy dramatically paused for effect before letting the audience know what the ruling was.

“The contact on the defender has been deemed . . . a common foul.”

Nobody knows how to work the crowd with pauses and fluctuations in his voice better than Kennedy.

This shouldn’t be shocking to longtime NBA fans. Bill Kennedy has enjoyed flamboyantly doing his job for decades and always spices things up in ways that can truly be enjoyed by LGBTQ sports fans.

Kennedy is the only publicly out gay official in the NBA (Che Flores is trans, and Violet Palmer is retired). He felt inclined to come out in 2015 after longtime Boston Celtics point guard Rajon Rondo called him a gay slur during a game.

Kennedy’s brave announcement was revolutionary at the time as most people don’t know a lot about sports referees’ personal lives.

While that’s the way it should be, it was vital for other players besides just Rondo to know that calling people bigoted names on the court is highly inappropriate. You never know who might be part of the LGBTQ community and not out.

Knowing there are gay people in sports, from the athletes to the referees, represents diversity and a more accepting future.

We hope that Bill Kennedy will always let his fun personality shine and bring a little more levity to the games he works. It is just sports, after all. We shouldn’t take all of this stuff so seriously anyway.

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