Jason Collins, the first openly gay active pro athlete in a major U.S. professional sport, has announced his retirement from the NBA.
The former center will make it official Wednesday night at the Barclays Center, where the Brooklyn Nets play.
“It has been 18 exhilarating months since I came out in Sports Illustrated as the first openly gay man in one of the four major professional team sports. And it has been nine months since I signed with the Nets and became the first openly gay male athlete to appear in a game in one of those leagues,” Collins wrote in a column for this week’s SI.