Is something fishy going on with Enes Kanter Freedom All-Star voting?
The NBA released the voting numbers this week for the 2022 All-Star Game, and it revealed something very strange about Enes Kanter Freedom.
The All-Star Game starters and captains were announced by the league on Thursday. Fans were able to vote for any player in the NBA, and their collective vote was 50 percent of the weighted total. Players and media members also made up 25 percent each of the total vote. The five players in each conference with the highest weighted scores were named starters while the top player in each conference was named that conference’s captain.
In addition to naming the All-Star starters and captains, the NBA provided a link to the full amount of votes that each player in the league received. You can see the link that they provided here.
One of the most bizarre revelations from the voting results had to do with the Boston Celtics center Freedom. According to the numbers released by the NBA, Kanter received exactly zero fan votes. That’s right, zero.
Obviously, Freedom, who is averaging 3.7 points and 4.6 rebounds per game this season, is not at All-Star caliber. But even the most unknown players in the NBA received several hundred to several thousand votes. Have you ever even heard of Joe Wieskamp of the San Antonio Spurs? He got 553 total fan votes. What about Arnoldas Kulboka of the Charlotte Hornets? He got 2,027 fan votes. Matt Mooney of the New York Knicks? 243 fan votes.
Freedom was one of just two players (the other being Georgios Kalaitzakis, a Milwaukee Bucks rookie with a difficult-to-spell name) to receive zero total fan votes. The next lowest was Anthony Tolliver of the New Orleans Pelicans with 27 fan votes.
Even more bizarre is that the NBA appeared to have scrubbed Kanter’s name (as well as that of Kalaitzakis) from the list of vote totals by Friday. Kanter’s name was between those of Danuel House and Semi Ojeleye on Thursday but gone from the list altogether by Friday.
LBS was able to capture screenshots of Kanter’s name on the voting list before it was apparently deleted. Take a look.
On Thursday, the NBA revealed that @EnesFreedom received ZERO total fan votes for the All-Star Game despite even the most unknown players getting several hundred to several thousand votes each.
On Friday, his name was deleted from the NBA’s voting page altogether. @LBSports pic.twitter.com/7iOJ1kyKoF
— Jason Squilliams (@JasonSquilliams) January 28, 2022
Fans often vote for players ironically or vote for players that are especially popular in their community or area of the world. That is what makes it so difficult to believe that Freedom did not even get a single vote. Maybe his name change from Enes Kanter to Enes Kanter Freedom threw off the voting algorithm somehow.
But we do know that Freedom is perhaps the single most outspoken player in the NBA when it comes to sociopolitical issues. Freedom is not afraid to make strong political statements online, sounding off especially on alleged human rights abuses in China as well as the NBA’s supposed refusal to do anything about them. Freedom once even made an anti-China statement during a game that was not popular with the league. Additionally, Freedom has regularly criticized LeBron James, who is the captain of this year’s West All-Stars and received the most fan votes of any player in the NBA.
All in all, that makes Freedom a very prominent newsmaker these days whose name is often in the headlines and who has garnered support from various segments of the population. That is why it is even more bizarre that Freedom did not receive a single All-Star fan vote this year, especially since his name was then apparently deleted from the NBA voting page altogether.
Photo: Nov 22, 2019; Denver, CO, USA; Boston Celtics center Enes Kanter (11) before the game against the Denver Nuggets at the Pepsi Center. Mandatory Credit: Ron Chenoy-USA TODAY Sports