In this era of sports and social activism, Enes Kanter has and continues to be one of the NBA’s most vocal athletes, utilizing social and mainstream media to get his message across. Earlier in the year, China removed the Celtics from the streaming service Tencent after Kanter made critical comments regarding Tibet.
Over the weekend, he drew attention to Taiwan on Twitter which garnered the attention of Tsai Ing-wen, the president of the republic of China (Taiwan):
That video was followed up on Sunday with this playful video from Kanter:
It’s unclear whether Kanter was directing his tweet towards the Celtics coaching staff or the league as a whole, but on Monday, head coach Ime Udoka addressed the situation anyway:
“The thing I tell the players is, we have a lot of guys that aren’t playing, but could be playing and want to play. I talk to those guys about staying prepared, being professional, and ready to play. I’ve been in the same situation as a player, but our playing time reasoning is strictly based on basketball,” Udoka said.
He’s worn personally designed shoes to draw attention to his various campaigns, but unfortunately for Kanter, his protest footwear has rarely seen the floor. But on Monday night in Cleveland, after Robert Williams did not return to the floor after halftime, Kanter played crucial minutes to secure a split against the Cavaliers. He scored five points and grabbed two offensive rebounds in the win.
