http://www.startribune.com/511/story/988294.html Four or five heads turned, all at once, in guard Troy Hudson's direction. Smiles and snickers quickly followed in the Timberwolves' locker room about 90 minutes before the game Wednesday at Target Center. The question normally would have been innocuous -- so, did you know John Amaechi fairly well? -- but not at that precise moment, not on the day that the former NBA center more or less told the world that he was gay. "I just knew him as a teammate," Hudson said, waving off the small audience of Wolves players. "He was a cool guy. I didn't expect that [announcement]. He kept it pretty hush-hush." As Mark Madsen filled in a couple of Wolves who didn't know Amaechi (he retired in 2003) or hadn't heard the news, Hudson tuned out the locker-room teasing. He and Amaechi played one full season together in Orlando in 2000-01. "That's his own personal preference," Hudson said. "So you can't fault a man for who they are or what they are. It's probably a good thing for himself that he finally opened up. He's probably been going through a lot trying to keep it a secret." Amaechi, who played at Penn State before spending five seasons in the NBA, became the first pro basketball player to openly identify himself as a homosexual. He has a book, "Man in the Middle," coming out later this month. And like most athletes from other team sports who have shared that info, he waited until he no longer was an active player. Would Amaechi have been accepted in the NBA had players, coaches and fans known he was gay during his career? "Probably not," Hudson said. "The majority of people in pro sports -- I mean, in the world -- don't feel comfortable with that type of person around. Especially in a masculine sport where you're always touching each other, you have to take showers together. But the way I see it, if you keep it to yourself, I don't care what you are." From the chatter in the room -- with one player saying, "I hope he tells on everybody. I want to know" -- Hudson probably was right. As for fans heckling a gay player, the Wolves guard said: "They definitely would do that. It's a cruel world." Davis: 'It's cool' Wolves swingman Ricky Davis had avoided reporters' questions through three media sessions -- postgame Monday, practice Tuesday and shootaround Wednesday morning -- but finally talked before Wednesday night's game about coach Randy Wittman's decision not to start him in the second half of Minnesota's blowout loss at Houston. "It was a little frustrating. But he's the coach," Davis said. "That's the change he made. You've got to live with it. ... It wasn't a real big deal. We were down 20. He wanted to find some energy." Davis said he and Wittman had not discussed the move since it happened. The Wolves' second-leading scorer was back in the starting lineup Wednesday night against Golden State. "You just live with it," Davis said. "You go out and do what the coaches want. Everything's cool." With Wittman, too, it seemed. "I don't have any lingering effects with anybody," Wittman said. "I'm just, as a coach, trying to get things headed in the direction that we need. Decisions are based upon that. There's nothing with anybody on this team. We're going with the same lineup, and we'll see where we're at by how we react tonight." --

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