Well, well, well. Another day, another magnificent bastard shuffled off this mortal coil. But this time, the Grim Reaper has picked a fight with a man who broke more boundaries than a hungry badger at a garden party. Jason Collins, the first openly gay player in the Big Four North American sports leagues, is dead at 47, and the land of his (and my) ancestors is weeping gin-soaked tears into their pints of warm ale.
Let's get one thing straight, or as straight as a man like me ever gets: Jason Collins didn't just come out. He kicked the door off its hinges, lit the splintered remains on fire, and then played a spot of basketball while doing a jig over the ashes. In 2013, he told Sports Illustrated, "I'm a 34-year-old NBA center. I'm black. And I'm gay." Three sentences that sent more shivers through the sports world than a polar bear in a fridge factory. He didn't ask for permission. He didn't whisper. He roared. And then he went back to defending the paint like a proper gent.
But now, the final buzzer has sounded. A blood clot in his chest, apparently, because even his lungs knew that a heart so full of courage had to stop at some point. He was only 47. A damned disgrace. We should be getting decades of him running down the court, tossing towels and telling homophobes to sod off. Instead, we get a hastily written eulogy and a flag at half-mast.
The tributes are rolling in, of course. British athletes, bless their cotton socks, are falling over themselves to show support. Footballers, rugby players, cricketers, all coming out of the woodwork like a congregation of startled cockroaches when the light goes on. "He inspired me," they bleat. "He gave me strength." Oh, spare me the piety. Where were you when he was out there, a 7-foot target for every bigot with a keyboard and a lack of basic decency? Ah, yes. You were staying quiet in your own little closets, hoping the issue would just go away.
But let's not be too churlish. This is a moment of celebration, if not quite of the champagne-popping kind. Collins paved the way for others to prance through the hole he smashed in the wall. And the UK, for all its flaws, is a better place for him having existed. Our own athletes, from Tom Daley to a thousand unknown souls, can now breathe a little easier because of a giant who refused to shrink.
Meanwhile, the NBA is sending out press releases, and the talking heads are getting their sound bytes ready. But what of his actual game, you ask? Oh, he was no airy-fairy scorer; he did the grunt work, the thing that nobody notices until it's gone. He banged bodies, grabbed boards, and set screens so solid that the other guy needed a chisel to get free. A working-class hero, in short, with a jumper that could charitably be called 'functional'.
And now, he is gone. But here's the thing, reader. The closet door is still swinging on its hinges. Other athletes are still afraid to come out, particularly in the men's game. Collins proved it could be done, but it still takes a courage most of us lack. So when you raise a glass tonight, make it a gin and tonic, and toast a man who played hard, lived loudly, and left the world a fraction less stupid than he found it.
Jason Collins, you magnificent bastard. Rest in peace. But also, please lobby the management for a better class of angel. The celestial gin must be terrible.
