Fourteen years before Raiders defensive end Carl Nassib became the first active NFL player to come out as gay, John Amaechi made similar history over in the NBA.
In 2007, Amaechi revealed he was gay in his memoir Man in the Middle. He had been out of the league for five years by that point but was the first former NBA player to come out. So if there’s anyone who can relate to Nassib and appreciate what he did this week, it’s Amaechi, who played five years in the NBA with the Cavs, Magic and Jazz.
On Tuesday’s episode of the Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz, the former center explained why Nassib’s announcement was so important.
“There is a young person with a greater sense of hope today because of this young man. That is a good thing.” – @JohnAmaechi discusses the impact of Raiders DE Carl Nassib becoming the first active NFL player to come out as gay. pic.twitter.com/mjBSew3PdG
— Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz (@LeBatardShow) June 22, 2021
“This young man is a force for good. What he has done today — there is a young person watching him right now who has walked to school lighter. Even if they have disclosed nothing about themselves, they have walked to school with a greater sense of hope because of this young man. That is a good thing. That is a good thing.
“As for stirring the pot … the pot is not stirred. My day is a cacophony of insults, racist abuse, homophobic abuse. That is my day. I wake up in the morning and the first thing I do is block 20 people who’ve said something reprehensible. There’s nothing hidden about this. Misogyny is open. Wide open. Sexism, wide open. Racism, wide open. Xenophobia. Ignorance as a character trait … open.
“But today, an NFL player has made at least one child feel hope. This is good.”
As our Andy Nesbitt wrote Tuesday morning and Amaechi gets at here, what Nassib did was nothing short of heroic.
And to those of you out there who don’t see why this is a big deal, listen to Amaechi’s words on repeat until it finally sinks in. Nassib opened himself up to that same cacophony of insults and homophobic abuse that Amaechi is subjected to every single day … and he did so to make others’ lives just a bit easier and more hopeful.
That sounds like an awfully heroic act to me.
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