Enes Kanter Freedom has come forward with new allegations regarding the culture of the NBA during his playing career and sent a warning to the WNBA amid his ongoing feud regarding the league’s gender eligibility policy.
Freedom’s new statements come one day after the WNBA tried to direct him to sit in a private luxury suite at Game 3 of the WNBA Finals in Atlanta instead of the courtside seat he purchased, amid security concerns. The change in arrangement resulted in a highly-publicized encounter with police at the entrance of State Farm Arena, which resulted in Freedom leaving the venue entirely amid disagreements over where he wanted to sit.
Now Freedom is revealing that his former Boston Celtics teammate Dennis Schröder privately questioned LeBron James’ motives as an activist, and that his Celtics teammates once shunned him for making an appearance on Fox News in his final year in the league in 2021.
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According to Freedom, he asked Schröder that season what James was like as a teammate and how he viewed James’ public advocacy.
“He said, ‘Whatever is LeBron doing is for LeBron.’ I was like, enough said. We don’t have to say a word anymore. Because, uh, I used to respect him a lot, you know, uh, for what he’d done for Black community. Uh, but when one of his former teammates said, you know, all his advocacy is for, is for LeBron, um, that’s where, that’s where he lost me.”
Freedom also criticized James’ conduct during the national anthem before Philadelphia’s season opener against the Knicks on Tuesday. Video showed James making apparent golf and shooting motions during the performance, prompting criticism from President Donald Trump on Thursday.
“But I mean, everybody knows LeBron James… I call him the dictator of the NBA. And I think President Trump said the best. You know, he disrespects our country and disrespects our flag,” Freedom said. “LeBron James is the reason the NBA is woke still. I promise you, once he retires, NBA is not going to be as woke as now.”
In terms of the league’s “woke” culture, Freedom also recalled an incident in his final year when he was praised for doing a television appearance on CNN, but shunned for going on Fox News to discuss the same topic of human rights abuses in China.
“I actually attended a show on CNN. The next day I walk in the locker room, they were saying, ‘Good job last night, we watched your interview, keep doing what you’re doing,” he said. “The next morning I walk in the locker room, nobody said a word to me. They were not even looking at me. I was getting these dirty looks. I asked one of my teammates, I’m like, what happened?”
Freedom said a teammate explained that the objection was to the outlet carrying his message.
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“They said, well, we watched your interview again last night. I’m like, okay. It’s not your interviews, it’s who you did it with. I walk on the court, one of my assistant coaches came up to me and whisper— he was whispering in my ear, hey man, me and my family watched you last night, good job. I’m like, why are you whispering?”
According to Freedom, the coach feared a backlash of his own.
“He said, because I don’t want your teammates to know that I watch Fox News. I was like, why? They said, well, because none of them will talk to me the rest of the year.”
Freedom said he explained to teammates that appearing on the network did not mean endorsing a political party, and that he wanted his human rights advocacy to reach a wider audience. But they weren’t receptive to that reasoning, he claims.
“In NBA circles, we don’t talk about Fox News, we don’t watch Fox News, and if you do, you will realize that you are going to get cancelled and you’re going to get hated on,” Freedom said.
But Freedom also claimed that those beliefs are different in private, for some, claiming that that some players privately support conservative causes and President Donald Trump but conceal those views because they fear how they would be treated.
But Freedom claimed some NBA players privately support conservative causes and Trump while concealing those views because they fear how others would treat them.
“But there are many people actually that supports the conservative movements, supports the Republican Party, uh, many of them actually supports President Trump, but just because of they know that they will get canceled and they will get hated on throughout the whole year, they’re just hiding it. I mean, you’re not even allowed to say you watch Fox News,” Freedom said.
Freedom said he has encountered similar reluctance to speak publicly among former NBA colleagues discussing his current campaign to push the WNBA to explicitly restrict eligibility to biological females.
He said some initially questioned his tactics, but expressed support after he explained his intentions.
“I don’t want to give their name because I know, I just know that as soon as I expose their name, then there will be a lot of questions,” Freedom said.
According to Freedom, those conversations included players telling him “we cannot help you,” while also saying, “but now we understand what you’re doing and we support you and we will pray for you.”
Freedom also pointed to a podcast conversation with Michael Porter Jr., saying Porter initially had questions about the campaign and understood his position better after they discussed it. He did not identify the other players he said privately supported him.
Meanwhile, Freedom named Kevin Durant, Patrick Beverley, Matt Barnes and Stephen Jackson among the current and former NBA players he said have criticized him, challenging them to discuss their disagreements directly.
“Invite me to your podcast and let’s sit down and talk. And let me explain to you why am I doing the things that I’m doing. Don’t just go on Twitter. Don’t just go on social media and just tweet about it. You know how to, you know, you have my number.”
His campaign to join the WNBA has now culminated in two hostile incidents at WNBA arenas after he was ejected from a Chicago Sky game in August, and then faced police resistance while trying to enter State Farm Arena on Wednesday night.
Freedom said one of the reasons that sitting courtside on Wednesday was so important to him was because he wanted to make sure that his shirt, which read “What is a woman?” would be as visible as possible during the game. Asked whether he wanted television cameras to capture his “What is a woman?” shirt from courtside, he acknowledged that visibility was part of his thinking.
“I mean, that was one of the reasons maybe. My main reason was I wanted to support the WNBA,” he said.
But he said accepting the suite was never an option.
“They were trying to put me in a prison box. And I mean, everyone knows me that I’m not going to bow down or kneel to someone who is trying to silence me,” Freedom said.
The Atlanta Dream and State Farm Arena said the arrangement responded to safety concerns Freedom himself had raised with authorities and basketball officials. They said the suite would have additional security and was intended to protect him and other guests.
Although Freedom objected to being surrounded by police at the entrance, he acknowledged that the officers treated him courteously.
“They were very, actually very kind. They were trying to do their job, and I was being very very nice to them as well,” he said. “This is not their fault.”
He nevertheless rejected suggestions that he should have accepted the seating arrangement or handled the encounter more diplomatically.
“I think I handled everything perfectly,” he said.
Freedom also pushed back against accusations that his campaign is a publicity stunt, pointing to threats he said included references to Charlie Kirk’s shooting.
“I think people need to understand I’m getting death threats every hour. I mean, I showed you that the text messages, you know, yesterday that people are sending me pictures and videos of the moment that Charlie Kirk got shot and said, you are next,” he said.
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“So I’m not that crazy. I’m not going to put my life on risk just to get attention.”
Freedom said the campaign would end if the WNBA explicitly restricted eligibility to biological females. The league has already declared Freedom and fellow former NBA player Royce White ineligible, while its collective bargaining agreement limits participation to women without specifying sex assigned at birth.
“I’m literally telling the league that define what a woman is, or add the word biological in your collective bargaining next to the word female. I will disappear the next day,” Freedom said.
But he said he was finished initiating further discussions with league officials.
“If they would like to sit down and have a conversation with me, listen, I love diplomacy,” he said. “But I’m done reaching out. So if they would like to reach out, uh, go ahead. You have my number.”
Despite the league’s eligibility determination, Freedom said he still intends to attend the next draft and continue preparing for it. He also claimed the campaign could expand to include additional male professional players, whom he did not identify.
“If they don’t draft me and if they don’t change the rules, now they have to deal with 6 other male professional players,” he said.
“And if not, again, this is not a threat, next year will be very interesting.”
