Enes Freedom has been out of the league since last year. The last game he played was a win against the Brooklyn Nets, after which he was released. Freedom, earlier known as Enes Kanter, is an American citizen of Turkish descent.
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The drama began a couple of years ago when he decided to attack his go-to target, LeBron James. The face of the NBA made perfect sense to target, and he even had a custom pair of shoes made to further his “revolution” against the Chinese.
By no means was Enes a Hall of Fame player, but he was, at one point, an 18 PPG center. After his tryst with the Knicks, he saw his minutes dwindle. He had already shown signs of unrest towards China, and Adam Silver must have caught a whiff of it.
Why has Enes Freedom been targeting the NBA?
Freedom has always considered him a social justice warrior. He’s been saying for the last half-decade that the NBA, and its main star, LeBron James, have no morals. He boldly claims that they only care about the money and not the genocide that they’re supporting.
This statement from him comes because of China’s extended support to Russia in the ongoing tussle for supremacy over Ukraine.
The statement also comes very close to him announcing another bombshell: he’s considering running for office. Maybe he’s forgetting an important rule in the constitution: Senators need at least 9 years of citizenship. He’s been one for 2 years.
Enes has openly criticized Nike and their manufacturing methods, and when the China-NBA scandal broke, he couldn’t stay silent any longer. “I’m going to do it with a smile on my face” sounds like a line from a Batman comic, not from someone who plans to be in power.
With a bounty on him, Freedom has no more “freedom” to go back to his home country. He’s blocked from earning his bread and butter, and his family is held, hostage. A hole has been dug, and he’s struggling to get out.
Players who take political stances threatening to expose hypocrisy, are hypocrites themselves
Enes has been at odds with one government—his home country—since his passport was revoked in 2017. And, like former Arsenal star Mesut Ozil, he began to boycott China after learning about the treatment of Uyghur Muslims.
Both the Turkish-born players met with the same fate: they got blackballed from their teams. With Arsenal, Ozil was at the pinnacle of his powers. Because of his anti-China stance, he has been kicked off the team and forced to play in Turkey.
Players’ hypocrisy is revealed when they accept payments happily and then show contempt for that very institution. Enes Freedom has been vocal about his problems with China and its capitalistic approach.
He wore the brand he despises on his jersey for years, accepted money from the institution that he claims blackballed him, and claimed that the NBA’s face has no morals. All while tweeting things from a phone that was built in China. Where is the consistency?
