Jason Collins, a 7-foot center and N.B.A. journeyman who in 2013 became the first openly gay player in any of the four traditional major American men’s sports leagues, has died. He was 47.
Adam Silver, the N.B.A. commissioner, announced the death in a statement on Tuesday. Collins’s family said he died of glioblastoma, an aggressive form of brain cancer. In December, he disclosed his diagnosis and said he was undergoing treatments.
Collins entered the N.B.A. in 2001, in a period when professional basketball was less perimeter-oriented and geared toward taller players who played closer to the rim. While he was never a scoring leader or even a full-time starter, his height, professionalism and ability to defend against other centers made him a valuable asset to six N.B.A. teams in a professional career that lasted 13 seasons.
When he retired in 2014, Collins said he hoped to be remembered as “a great teammate, someone who always sacrificed for the team.”
But his achievements on the court were eclipsed by a front-page essay he wrote in Sports Illustrated in 2013.
“I’m a 34-year-old N.B.A. center. I’m Black and I’m gay,” it began.
In the essay, Collins said he was spurred to speak publicly after his former Stanford University roommate, Joe Kennedy, a congressman from Massachusetts at the time, marched in a Pride parade in Boston.
“I’m seldom jealous of others, but hearing what Joe had done filled me with envy,” Collins wrote. “I was proud of him for participating but angry that as a closeted gay man I couldn’t even cheer my straight friend on as a spectator.”
Collins was a free agent when he wrote the essay, and there was an open question about whether it would end his career. Though the gay rights movement had made significant strides, gay marriage would not be made legal nationwide until 2015 and American men’s professional sports had not historically been welcoming to gay athletes.
The praise wasn’t universal. “All these beautiful women in the world and guys wanna mess with other guys SMH…” the Miami Dolphins wide receiver Mike Wallace wrote on Twitter, using shorthand for “shaking my head.” He later apologized.
But the largely positive response from other N.B.A. figures showed how views about gay people had shifted. The Los Angeles Lakers star Kobe Bryant, who was fined by the N.B.A. in 2011 for directing an anti-gay slur at a referee, posted a message of support for Collins on social media: “Proud of @jasoncollins34. Don’t suffocate who u r because of the ignorance of others.”
Collins also received a supportive call from the retired star point guard Tim Hardaway, who in 2007 told a radio station that he hated gay people and that he would not have wanted to be on the same team as John Amaechi, another former player who had come out that year. Hardaway has since become a vocal supporter of gay rights.
Hardaway’s evolution was “something that many people in the L.G.B.T.Q. community are very familiar with,” Collins told The St. Paul Pioneer Press in 2022.
“They might start off on one end of the spectrum as far as not being supportive and being homophobic,” he said. “But then over time of having more exposure and more education, then they become an ally and next thing you know they’re at the Pride parade celebrating. That’s literally how it happened with Tim.”
No team signed Collins before the start of the 2013-14 season. He wasn’t even invited to any training camps. But midway through the season, Collins, then 35, signed with the Brooklyn Nets, the team where he began his career when it was based in New Jersey.
“My message to other athletes, period, is just be yourself,” Collins said after his first appearance with the team in February 2014, adding, “Never be afraid or ashamed or have any fear to be your true authentic self.”
Jason Paul Collins was born on Dec. 2, 1978, in Los Angeles to Paul and Portia Collins. His mother, who was expecting just one child, gave birth to Jason’s twin brother, Jarron, eight minutes after delivering him. Jason and Jarron attended the private Harvard-Westlake School in Los Angeles, where they led the basketball team to two state Division III titles. The twins were teammates at Stanford before moving on to the N.B.A.
Jason Collins was selected as the 18th overall pick in 2001 by the Houston Rockets and was swiftly traded to the Nets. He spent his first six seasons with the Nets, and was a key part of teams that made the finals in 2002 and 2003, the most successful stretch in franchise history. He would play for six teams over 13 seasons.
After retiring in November 2014, Collins was a public speaker and political activist, campaigning for Hillary Clinton in 2016, and becoming a critic of President Trump. After Carl Nassib became the first active N.F.L. player to come out as gay in 2021, Collins told The Los Angeles Times, “As professional athletes, we’re used to inspiring the next generation, people who are younger than us. But he’s going to find that his actions have inspired not only people who are younger than him but older than him.”
Collins married Brunson Green, a film producer, in May 2025. In addition to his husband, Collins is survived by his parents and his brother, Jarron, who played 10 seasons in the N.B.A., most of them with the Utah Jazz, and is now an assistant coach with the New Orleans Pelicans.
In an essay for ESPN in which he revealed his glioblastoma diagnosis, Collins recalled his announcement from more than a decade earlier.
“I got to tell my own story, the way I wanted to. And now I can honestly say, the past 12 years since have been the best of my life,” he wrote. “Your life is so much better when you just show up as your true self, unafraid to be your true self, in public or private.”
