Michael Sam

“Mizzou was my real family. I loved it. Football was a sense of home. A home I never had.”

“There will always be haters. Small heroes can change society every day. It just takes time.”

“If I want to kiss my boyfriend, I'm gonna kiss him. If they want to film it, that's their problem. Don't be mad at me for sharing a huge moment in my life with someone I love.”

“I am an openly proud gay man.”

“A straight person doesn't have to go in the media and tell them that they're straight, and I don't think a gay person should do that, neither. But that's the society we have to live in.”

“To be a great NFL player, you have to know what your opponent is doing, not just opposite your position but what they're doing all over the field. All the contingencies.”

“To see hundreds of people come out in the cold at the University of Missouri to block a few so-called Christians who came to protest against me shows you how love conquers hate.”

“I'll say this: I want to become a distraction! And what I mean is by making big plays and doing good stuff on the field. Although nobody would print that, because that's not a story. Gotta keep bringing up the locker-room situation because he's gay.”

“I needed football - it was just something to do, an excuse to not be at home.”

“I sing because it takes, for a brief second, it takes a little from my past, and just in that moment, I'm just happy and I'm glad to be who I am. That's the reason why.”

“I didn't even dream of going to college. College was not in my definition. If somebody told me I was going to play for the Missouri Tigers in 2009, I would laugh at them.”

“I'm not afraid to tell the world who I am. I'm Michael Sam: I'm a college graduate. I'm African American, and I'm gay. I'm comfortable in my skin.”

“When I'm on the field, I really don't focus on fans. I just focus on my responsibility, which is the guy right across from me.”

“I can't think, 'Ah, that team should call me up.' The only thing I can do is stay in shape and wait. You can only control what you can control.”

“I knew from a young age that I was attracted to guys. I didn't know if it was a phase... I didn't want to say, 'Hey, I might be gay. I might be bi.' I just didn't know... I wanted to find who I was and make sure I knew what was comfortable. So I didn't tell anyone growing up.”

“My family was very notorious in the town that we lived in. Everyone would say, 'There goes those damn Sams.' I didn't want to paint that ill picture of me. I knew the good in my family. They didn't know our background and the adversity we had to endure. I wanted to succeed and be a beacon of hope in my family.”