Dave Kopay

as himself

DAVE KOPAY was the first professional athlete to declare his homosexuality.

Kopay played football at the University of Washington and then went on to a 10-year career in the United States’ NFL as a running back and special teams member for the San Francisco Forty-Niners, the Detroit Lions, the Washington Redskins, the New Orleans Saints, and the Green Bay Packers. Kopay retired in 1973 with a successful career behind him, but he had many conflicted feelings about himself and others he knew to be gay in professional football.

After considerable thought and introspection, Kopay decided it was time for some frank talk about issues of homosexuality, particularly homophobia, in the sports world. Rumors abounded for decades about athletes in individual sports such as tennis and figure skating, but no prominent figure had been willing to step forward publicly about his or her homosexuality until Kopay. In 1975, he became nothing short of an LGBT icon with a closet-busting interview in the Washington Star; that it was someone from a professional team sport like football who was willing to be the first was nothing short of astonishing.

Since his initial coming-out interview, Kopay has been an outspoken advocate for gay rights. In 1977 he co-authored “The Dave Kopay Story” with Perry Deane Young, a book that topped the New York Times bestseller list for weeks, and is still so popular it recently saw its fifth printing.

Kopay participated in New York’s Gay Games IV in 1994 by presenting the athletes’ oath during the opening ceremony and served as a judge in the physique competition; in 1995 he became an official Gay Games Ambassador.

Few professional athletes followed his lead; several who have come out since are among his fellow Gay Games Ambassadors, such as Esera Tuaolo, who cited Kopay as an inspiration for his own struggles to live openly within the football community.

Today, Kopay lives in Los Angeles and continues making speeches on the importance of living an honest life. His book has become standard reference material for NFL teams contemplating positive ways to react should one of their players come out publicly. Kopay believes that the sports world is a place that still has much work to do to combat bigotry against gay men and women, from even the youngest school levels up through professional ranks.