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David Marquette Kopay (born June 28, 1942) is a former American football running back in the National Football League (NFL) who in 1975 became one of the first professional athletes to come out as gay.
This is also a man who, in 1975, became the first professional athlete from a major team sport (he retired from the NFL in 1972) to announce publicly that he was gay — an act of candor that turned the most masculine of sports on its head, shattering its definitions of courage and toughness.
Dave Kopay was the first professional team sport athlete to declare his homosexuality. Since that moment in 1975, three years after his retirement from a nine-year career as an NFL running...
Jun 23, 2021 · Dave Kopay was the first NFL player to come out in 1975, but it took 46 years for another active player to follow his lead. Read about his journey, his frustration, and his reaction to Carl Nassib's historic announcement.
Sep 4, 2012 · Dave Kopay's apartment in Los Angeles has the requisite ephemera of a finished sports career: the team photos, the plaques, the display of helmets over the big-screen TV, one for each...
Oct 31, 2020 · We conclude our series with the NFL player who remains the most significant out gay athlete of our lifetime: Dave Kopay. Every day during LGBTQ history month, we’ve told a story from our...
Jun 15, 2022 · David Kopay was a fullback who played for six teams in nine years in the NFL. He came out as gay in 1977 and credited Lions teammate Alex Karras with supporting him as a friend.
