Jamie Kuntz, North Dakota college footballer, says he was kicked off team for gay kiss

Jamie Kuntz, an 18-year-old in North Dakota freshman linebacker, says he was kicked off his college football team after kissing his 65-year-old boyfriend during a game.

According to the Associated Press, the North Dakota State College of Sciences acknowledges that Kuntz was disciplined by the team, but not because he's gay.

Football coach Chuck Parsons wrote to Kuntz — who is on a partial football scholarship — saying that he was dismissed for lying about the kiss.

Kuntz was reportedly attending an away game at Snow College in Pueblo, Colorado when, on the injured list with a concussion, he was asked to film the game for his teammates.

Kuntz’s boyfriend, who lives in Denver, drove to Pueblo for the match and sat with him in the empty press box.

According to Kuntz, his team — the Wildcats — were down by more than 40 points when "the kiss just happened."

A teammate who saw the kiss told coaches, and when Parsons confronted Kuntz, he said the man he kissed was his grandfather.

"I lied," Kuntz said.

"People around here aren't exposed to it," Kuntz said of homosexuality. "People expect gays to be flamboyant, not football players."

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The Sept. 3 letter from Parsons said Kuntz was being dismissed from the team for "conduct deemed detrimental to the team," and specifying the player's manual section on "lying to coaches, teachers or other school staff."

Kuntz shared the letter with Dan Savage, who posted it on the Stranger blog.

"This decision was arrived at solely on the basis of your conduct during the football game; and because you chose not to be truthful with me when I confronted you about whom else was in the box with you," Parsons wrote.

"Any conduct by any member of the program that would cause such a distraction during a game would warrant the same consequences."

According to the blog, Kuntz dreamt of being a professional football player and despite offers from bigger colleges had chosen North Dakota State College of Science the position he wanted to play.

“My plan was to play at NDSCS for one or two years and then transfer to a bigger school," he said.

The blog cites Cyd Zeigler of Outsports.com, the online gay sports community, as writing:

"It's ludicrous to say Jamie's sexual orientation had nothing to do with his release from the team. Kissing someone during a game isn't a distraction unless it's a 'gay kiss.' And even if it were a distraction, a slap on the wrist is more than enough to get the point across. Kicking him off the team for such a minor offense comes from one place and one place only: homophobia."

The sentiment is shared in the Twittersphere by numerous posters on Kuntz's page and elsewhere: