Former U.S. women’s soccer star Megan Rapinoe jumped into the criticism of former NBA player Enes Kanter Freedom over his comments about protecting women’s sports and his bid to be included in the 2027 WNBA Draft.
Appearing on her own Why Are You Like This? podcast, Rapinoe torched Freedom after he was kicked out of a recent WNBA game in Chicago. And she criticized his comments about how he is only trying to protect women, according to OutKick.
“He later, in continuing the absolute grift that was this whole thing, gave some quotes to OutKick Sports and Fox News — no surprise there—saying that he was just out there to protect women. Well, oh my God, thank you so much because that’s what we were asking for,” Rapinoe bloviated.
“In fairness, you did warn us about men forcing their way into WNBA spaces. Lo and behold…Oh, you weren’t talking about yourself? OK. People who are ‘trying to protect women.’ First of all, from who? From who? It’s yourself. It’s a big mirror. Y’all are the same people who were, like, shitting on the league and its athletes from before, saying it was bad business and no one cared. You’re the same people who were banning people from playing soccer in the 1950s. You’re the same type of people,” she added.
“Oh, but now they care about it a lot, don’t they?” she continued. “Because they’re seeing the success and the power the league has, and they’re seeing how popular it is and seeing how everybody loves it and how lit of a space it is. So, now they really care. So, they are going to try and continue coming after the W and other women’s sports leagues and their athletes after seeing all the power they have.”
Rapinoe went on to claim that anyone who opposes allowing men who claim to be women into women’s sports is a “bad-faith actor.”
“This is not the same old story of, ‘Well, this is just online, or it’s just trolls, it’s just bots. It’s not actually happening.’ No, it’s actually happening. They’re doing rallies before the game; they’re coming onto the court. They’re buying tickets. They’re in there — they’re not just trolls. They’re showing up in real life,” Rapinoe cried.
Then she made a strange argument that it is the people hoping to keep men out of women’s sports who are the ones really trying to destroy women.
“They want a mechanism to continue tearing down women, period, and women’s sports,” she exclaimed. “I hate that this is true, and I desperately want for us to get to a place where women athletes can just be left alone and be great and be paid well. People can come, watch, and just be respected. But that is clearly not where we are. The rise in women’s sports and the rise in popularity in all these sports leagues, particularly the W, has come hand-in-hand with the rise of this hate and discrimination. It’s why it’s important for us as women athletes to continue to speak out about these issues and continue to do it together to show a united and collective fight.”
Yet she seemed to contradict herself and added, “Let’s make one thing clear: we do not need men in the WNBA, or women’s sports in general, to make it successful.”
Rapinoe had previously said she was OK with transgender athletes competing in women’s pro soccer and other sports. But she made that claim just as she was finishing up her pro soccer career and knew she would never be in the position of facing a man entering women’s soccer.
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