Megan Rapinoe

Maybe you're not having a thousand times more injuries, but there's an aspect to the purity of the game and the quality of the game that is played on grass that is different on turf.

Be honest about how you approach failure. Don't just be critical of yourself, because that can be self-serving. Approach it honestly, assess your performance, and assess the areas where you have fallen short. Correct them and move on. Don't dwell on it. Don't hold on to it.

I think our existence in professional sports is almost a protest in and of itself in sometimes the very sexist society that we live in. For us, it's just kind of right in line with what we always do.

I feel like everyone is really craving people to come out. People want - they need - to see that there are people like me playing soccer for the good ol' U.S. of A.

In female sports, if you're gay, most likely your team knows it pretty quickly. It's very open and widely supported. For males, it's not that way at all. It's sad.

I feel like it's actually everybody's responsibility to use whatever platform they have to do good in the world, basically, and to try to make our society better, whether you're an accountant or an activist or an athlete or whatever it is. I think it's everybody's responsibility.

I think there's a lot of gay women in sports, and it's widely known in the team; they can live a pretty open lifestyle without being open in the media.

Being a woman, we talk about equal pay all the time. We're not talking about if you're black or if you are Latina. I would like to get back to that and improving the relationship between the police community and the community of color. I don't know exactly all the right things to say, but I want to engage in that conversation.

I guess [coming out publicly] seems like a weight off my shoulders. I’ve been playing a lot better than I’ve ever played before. I think I’m just enjoying myself and I’m happy.

If there's one thing this team doesn't lack, it's competitiveness and a desire to win. No matter if we come off a win or come off a loss, it seems like we don't really care. We're always motivated to win.

Maybe you are homophobic a little bit, but then you see me, and you've always loved me, and you love the way I play, and your kids love me. And then you're like, 'Oh, that's OK. It's fine.' Once it gets a little bit more personal, it helps break down those barriers.

I'm a pretty open book, so not being out publicly felt inauthentic. Hopefully we can get to a point where your personal life isn't anybody else's business, but until then, it's less about people having to know about your sexuality than standing up for what's right and fighting for equality.

When I take a knee, I am facing the flag with my full body, staring straight into the heart of our country's ultimate symbol of freedom - because I believe it is my responsibility, just as it is yours, to ensure that freedom is afforded to everyone in this country.

Being a gay American, I know what it means to look at the flag and not have it protect all of your liberties.

I do wish, when I was younger, that I knew that I was gay. It would have made things a lot clearer for me. Really. Looking back on it, it was so obvious, but it never really dawned on me. Socially, I felt like I didn't know how to be and who to be. If I had known back then, it would have given me more self-confidence.

You have someone like Colin or many of the other athletes who have knelt, especially athletes of colour, and if you're not respecting what they're saying, if you're not believing their charges of police brutality or racial inequality, you're saying that they're lying.

I think people now - you know, a lot of athletes have come out and said, I would definitely accept, you know, a gay male athlete in the locker room and on my team.

When we, as a nation, put our minds to something, when we truly choose to care about something, change always happens.