Out Pro Tennis Player João Lucas Reis da Silva Says He's Not the Only Gay Male Player

Brazilian tennis pro João Lucas Reis da Silva gained overnight notoriety as the sport's first active male player to come out, but statistically it doesn't make sense he would be alone.

That's something Reis da Silva himself pointed out in a recent interview, telling Clay Magazine, "I don't know about anyone else, but I think it's unlikely that I'm the only gay player on the tour."

Reis Da Silva came out more or less accidentally, with a casual post to Instagram last December in which he declared his love for his boyfriend, actor and model Guilherme Sampaio Ricardo. The post included photos showing the two in happy partnership.

The athlete told Clay that he outed himself "almost unconsciously, just because it was his birthday."

"And when I saw that the photo had repercussions in Europe, all over the world, I got a bit worried," Reis da Silva went on to add. "And then I sat down and started to think. I told myself no, what I had done was right, that I didn't have to hide anything from anyone else, that I had already lived that way for too long, trying to make sure that nobody knew anything."

"When I saw that the reactions were very good, I calmed down."

The instant attention and acclaim the post brought to the athlete caught him by surprise, he said subsequently – though he also said it gave him a "buzz."

Still, Reis da Silva doesn't portray himself as a role model or gay icon. "If that happens it would be great," the player told Clay of being a role model, only to add: "I don't know if I'm the person who should be setting an example."

"My life hasn't changed that much," the athlete went on to say. "I have to wake up in the morning and practice at nine.... But I see that a lot of people look at me and tell me they are proud, and that's very good, but it's not something I've sought."

"Men's professional tennis does not have a history like Reis,'" Clay noted, before detailing that there is no monolithic opinion within the tennis community as to how openly gay male players would generally be greeted by fans and colleagues.

"Players like the American Taylor Fritz told CLAY at the time that an openly gay player would be well received by his colleagues," the publication relayed, "while the Peruvian Juan Pablo Varillas posited a different theory: 'Maybe there are gay tennis players, but they are afraid. This is a macho sport.'"

(Note: In March, EDGE received word from Naomi Johnson, a tennis instructor who said that she, not Reis da Silva, was "the first openly gay Black tennis player," with Johnson having come out as gay prior to coming out as transgender.)

The fact that out athletes remain a rarity speaks more to the ongoing shadow of the closet than the innate athletic ability of people – or, conversely, any predisposition to talented athletes to be more generally straight than the general population. Statistics alone argue that there must be thousands, or even tens of thousands, of LGBTQ+ people playing at top levels across all athletic sectors, from soccer, to American football, to baseball, to tennis – and even famously roughneck sports like rugby.

Indeed, even the most conservative estimate regarding the prevalence of gay people – two or three out of every 100 people in the general population – would indicate that, with his current world ranking of 325, there are at least nine or ten players just among those ranked ahead of Reis da Silva. And that's just based on the percentage of people who say they are gay or lesbian; the percentage soars when it's a matter of how many people say they are LGBTQ+, which also includes bisexual, transgender, and queer people.

Indeed, one recent poll found that a stunning 9.3% of people now self-identify as LGBTQ+, with more than half that number being younger adults saying they are bisexual as opposed to strictly gay or straight.

Clay mentioned the statistic of one person in roughly ten being LGBTQ+, and Reis da Silva was not surprised.

"I don't think I'm that special, so I can't be the only one, I can't be that unique," he said. "I don't know anything about anyone, but I think it's unlikely that I'm the only gay player on the tour."

Though Reis de Silva stops short of saying he wants to be anyone's role model, he does point out one key difference between life in the closet and life after embracing authenticity. Before he came out publicly, he told friends, family, and his tennis colleagues. Right away, the homophobic slurs and joshing he'd heard in the locker room fell off, and "things I heard... I never heard again."

"They might talk among themselves when I'm not there," Reis da Silva mused, "but when I am there, the atmosphere is one of total respect. It was one of the best things I've ever felt."

"A long time ago I was someone who didn't want to talk to anyone about it, and when I started talking, when I felt calmer about myself and started talking to my friends, to everyone," the pro player went on to say, "and I saw that the reaction was one of protection, of support, I felt calmer, it did me a lot of good..."

"I started to live much more relaxed, much more relaxed," he added. "My relationship with my coaches improved a lot, with my family too."