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Former Las Vegas Raiders defensive end Carl Nassib broke ground when he became the first openly gay NFL player in 2021. However, just two years later, he has decided to step away from football.
Nassib announced in a September 6 Instagram post that he is officially retiring from the NFL.
“It really feels like just yesterday starting out as a walk-on at Penn State,” Nassib wrote. “Football has given me more than I ever could have imagined. I can truly hang up my helmet for the last time knowing I gave it everything I had.”
Nassib spent last season with the Tampa Buccaneers where he had 3.5 sacks. He’s only 30 so he’s retiring at a relatively young age. He never landed with a team in free agency this offseason but likely could’ve been added to a roster at some point in the coming weeks. Nassib also had stints with the Raiders and Cleveland Browns. He retires with 25.5 career sacks and 45 tackles for loss.
Carl Nassib Opens up About Retirement Decision
Carl Nassib is still young, healthy and should have plenty left in the tank to play a few more seasons. However, it takes a lot of mental energy to endure the rigors of an NFL season. While Nassib has only been in the NFL for seven years, he’s spent most of his life playing football.
“This would have been my 23rd football season,” Nassib told PEOPLE in a September 8 interview. “I’ve been playing football since I was eight years old, and I’m really excited to move on to the next chapter of my life.”
Nassib is now moving on to other things, which will be a transition. Playing football and working in a corporate office are two very different things.
“You have to earn your keep every single day,” Nassib said. “You have to remain humble and hungry, and it’s really cool because everybody who’s in the locker room with you buys into that. I’ll definitely miss that. So I try and bring some of that into the corporate world, but it’s just not the same.”
Nassib is still young so he has time to change his mind and come back to football but it looks like he’s content walking away for now.
Carl Nassib Plans to Work With NFL
Though Carl Nassib won’t be on the field playing anymore, he still has plans to be involved in the NFL. He doesn’t have a title quite yet but the league has shown interest in working with him due to his activism in the LGBTQ community.
“Maintaining that relationship shows that the NFL is continuing to support me. They’ve supported me so much over the last two years, and I really couldn’t have done it without that support,” Nassib told PEOPLE.
The NFL was very supportive when Nassib first came out as gay and matched his $100,000 donation to the Trevor Project. That’s something he has been appreciative about for a long time.
“The NFL went out of their way to support me, to support the Trevor Project, and to show how the impact of how one person doing something for others can be compounded,” Nassib told PEOPLE at the time.
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