Enes Kanter Freedom ejected from WNBA game after confrontation with player

Former NBA player Enes Kanter Freedom was ejected Sunday from a WNBA game between the Indiana Fever and Chicago Sky after a verbal altercation with Chicago’s Natasha Cloud.

Late in the third quarter, Cloud approached Freedom, who was sitting courtside and wearing a shirt that read, “Woman: noun. Adult human female.” Video shows the Sky guard pointing and yelling at the former NBA player, who was standing up with his arms stretched out and shouting back.

A security guard then escorted Freedom out of the arena. The Fever went on to win the game, 113-90, to move to 25-14 on the season.

Freedom, who last played for the Boston Celtics in the 2021-22 season, declared for the 2027 WNBA draft earlier this month.

Under WNBA policy, only women are eligible to play. A transgender woman has not competed in the league, according to ESPN, and the WNBA does not have a specific policy on the matter.

Before the game, Freedom posted on the social platform X a photo of a woman giving him the middle finger outside of Wintrust Arena in Chicago.

“Careful what you wish for, @WNBA,” Freedom later wrote on X , sharing a photo of him sitting courtside in his shirt. “Freedom of speech never looked this good. Somehow controversial.”

The former NBA player told Fox News that Cloud approached him after he celebrated Fever wing Sophie Cunningham making a 3-pointer.

“I put my hands up to celebrate. … Natasha came back and started screaming and yelling and said, ‘[Cunningham is] not going to sleep with you,’” Freedom, who joined a small rally in support of Cunningham outside the arena before the game, said.

For a profile of her published by ESPN in July, Cunningham said, “I want to protect young girls in a locker room, or young girls in sport who shouldn’t have to go against biological men.”

But Cunningham also said she does not hate transgender people and is “very much in the middle” politically.