Former pro-basketball player Jason Collins, the first active male athlete on a major American professional team sport to come out as gay, has died aged 47.
Collins shared late last year that he had been diagnosed with an aggressive form of brain cancer.
He was undergoing treatment to stop the spread of his inoperable disease.
“Jason Collins’ impact and influence extended far beyond basketball as he helped make the NBA, WNBA and larger sports community more inclusive and welcoming for future generations,” National Basketball Association (NBA) Commissioner Adam Silver said in a statement on Tuesday.
“Jason will be remembered not only for breaking barriers, but also for the kindness and humanity that defined his life and touched so many others,” Silver added.
The 47-year-old sports veteran said in December 2025 that the cancer was discovered after he was struggling to focus.
The brain tumour, he said, was like “a monster with tentacles spreading across the underside of my brain the width of a baseball”.
Without treatment, he would be dead within three months, doctors told Collins.
Collins died after a valiant fight with glioblastoma, his family said in a statement shared by the NBA.
“Jason changed lives in unexpected ways and was an inspiration to all who knew him and to those who admired him from afar,” his family said.