Jason Collins retires from NBA: “It feels wonderful to have been part of milestones for sports and for gay rights”

It was 18 months ago that Jason Collins came out publicly as a gay NBA player on the cover of Sports Illustrated.

Earlier today, he announced he is retiring from the league at the age of 35.

I’m so glad Jason got to play some with the Brooklyn Nets last season so he could make history as the first active openly gay player.

He got to prove that his being in the locker room with all those straight dudes did not cause the world to stop spinning on its axis.

Here are some excerpts from the retirement column Jason wrote for Sports Illustrated:

It feels wonderful to have been part of these milestones for sports and for gay rights, and to have been embraced by the public, the coaches, the players, the league and history.

It had been argued that no team would want to take on a player who was likely to attract a media circus from the outset and whose sexuality would be a distraction. I’m happy to have helped put those canards to rest. The much-ballyhooed media blitz to cover me unscrambled so quickly that a flack jokingly nicknamed me Mr. Irrelevant.

Among the memories I will cherish most are the warm applause I received in Los Angeles when I took the court in my Nets debut, and the standing ovation I got at my first home game in Brooklyn. It shows how far we’ve come.

There are still no publicly gay players in the NFL, NHL or major league baseball. Believe me: They exist. Every pro sport has them. I know some of them personally. When we get to the point where a gay pro athlete is no longer forced to live in fear that he’ll be shunned by teammates or outed by tabloids, when we get to the point where he plays while his significant other waits in the family room, when we get to the point where he’s not compelled to hide his true self and is able to live an authentic life, then coming out won’t be such a big deal. But we’re not there yet.