Prayers are pouring in for former NBA star Jason Collins, who just received a devastating diagnosis. The family of the basketball center, whose impressive career includes stints with the Brooklyn Nets, Boston Celtics and Atlanta Hawks, shared a heartbreaking update to his fans about his health.
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Collins’ family announced that he is battling a brain tumor and is undergoing treatment in a September 11 statement. The statement also thanked fans for their prayers and messages of support. They went on to ask for privacy as he focuses on his health.
Before being drafted by the Houston Rockets in 2001, Collins was a standout at Stanford University, where he was an NCAA All-American for the 2000–01 season. The Stanford men’s basketball team shared a tribute to Collins on social media.
“Sending our love and support to Jason, his husband Brunson, Jarron and the entire Collins family,” the team wrote in a post on X.
Messages of support also came in from the NBA, as well as some of Collins’ former teams, including the Boston Celtics.
Collins made history in 2013 when he came out as the first openly gay player in the NBA. In a Sports Illustrated open letter, he wrote that he wanted to continue playing the game he loves while being “genuine and authentic and truthful.”
“I’ve endured years of misery and gone to enormous lengths to live a lie. I was certain that my world would fall apart if anyone knew. And yet when I acknowledged my sexuality, I felt whole for the first time. I still had the same sense of humor, I still had the same mannerisms and my friends still had my back,” he wrote.
He also used his platform to honor the memory of Matthew Shepard, a gay college student who was tortured and killed for his sexuality in 1998 by wearing the number 98 for most of his career.
“Every time I put on that jersey, it was just a silent acknowledgment to myself and to my friends and family — who knew why I was wearing that number — of being a proud gay black man playing in the NBA,” he told PEOPLE in a 2018 interview. “Sort of hiding in plain sight.”
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