Clay Travis: Former Trans Player Layshia Clarendon Puts WNBA In Huge Legal Mess

This article was written by Clay Travis and published on Sport & State, a new media company founded by Travis that is built around sports, culture, original voices, and live conversation.

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Lost amid all the controversy surrounding Enes Kanter Freedom and Royce White, two former NBA players who have declared themselves eligible for the 2027 WNBA Draft in April, is a complicating factor that may explain why the WNBA, while attempting to leak that Freedom and White are not eligible for the draft, hasn’t actually told us what a woman is for purposes of the league’s eligibility rules. The WNBA has allowed a woman who identifies as a man to play in the league and said she is eligible to play even though she now says she’s a he.

Meet Layshia Clarendon.

Clarendon played 11 seasons in the WNBA and remained eligible despite having top surgery — the removal of her breasts — and other so-called gender reassignment treatments in 2021. She retired from the WNBA in 2024.

In January of 2021, Clarendon posted on social media, “It’s hard to put into words the feeling of seeing my chest for the first time free of breasts, seeing my chest the way I’ve always seen it, and feeling a sense of gender euphoria as opposed to gender dysphoria. Sighhh…freedom…freedom at last.”

WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert stated publicly at this time of Clarendon’s surgery: “We are so proud that Layshia is part of the WNBA and we know that their (Layshia uses they/them pronouns) voice and continued advocacy will not only support and help honor and uplift many other non-binary and trans people, but also encourage empathy and understanding for the community across all levels of sport.” The owner of the New York Liberty, Clarendon’s team at the time, Joseph Tsai, also said Layshia is “a proud embodiment of our belief that our strength lies in our truth and no one should live constrained by societal boundaries.”

Layshia has written, “Existing outside the binary for me is freedom. I’ve learned that my gender doesn’t fit into these molds that keep trying to hold it down and box it in. I know that my gender will keep evolving because we change and grow and shape shift and expand. I know that as Andrea Gibson says, my pronouns haven’t even been invented yet. I know that we all have masculinity and femininity inside of us and mine show up equally and wholly and fully.”

She says that her WNBA teammates helped her draw a mustache on her face so she would look more like a man. “One of my teammates, before I had my little mustache, she helped me fill it in one day for media day with her eyebrow pen. She was like, ‘Oh, try this!’ So that was such a sweet, tender moment of a teammate just seeing you and affirming you in the same way someone will be filling in their eyebrows or mascara on their eyelashes.”

Clarendon says she eventually grew a mustache raising an intriguing question: Was she receiving testosterone treatments when this occurred? That seems likely. So in addition to allowing a woman who identified as a man to play basketball in the league, it appears likely the league permitted gender treatments, including testosterone, for a player. Elevated levels of testosterone are prohibited in most leagues, male and female, because they are considered performance enhancing.

Not surprisingly, ESPN, via a trans writer, no less, did a huge feature story on how courageous Clarendon was. The article was published in 2021. You should read it. It lauds Clarendon for leading her team in wearing “Black Trans Lives Matter” t-shirts and speaks about her political activism. ESPN labeled Clarendon: The WNBA’s most influential player. The article, which was written amidst the peak-woke sports era, praises Clarendon for her left wing political activism:

“It was Clarendon’s idea to dedicate the 2020 season to the Say Her Name campaign. When the WNBPA launched the social justice council to steer the players’ activism efforts, Clarendon spearheaded it. When an idea was pitched to put “Black Lives Matter” on the court, Clarendon drew rudimentary sketches of basketball courts in Microsoft Paint, brainstorming how to make the concept work.”

In the bubble, the social justice council hosted webinars with the African American Policy Forum; politician Stacey Abrams; Tamika Palmer, Breonna Taylor’s mother; and others. Clarendon hosted a conversation with Raquel Willis, a Black transgender writer and activist. Clarendon also lent their expertise to the “Vote Warnock” campaign — the players’ successful mission to oust then-Atlanta Dream owner Kelly Loeffler from the U.S. Senate as well as from the league.”

Later the article continues the praise.

“Holding a microphone on that opening night of the 2020 season, and about to speak to a national audience on TV, Clarendon had that familiar feeling of a heavy emotional anchor, tying their feet to this moment and giving them courage. “I felt like I was standing on holy ground,” Clarendon says.

With no notes, Clarendon said their names. Sandra Bland. Atatiana Jefferson. Dominique Rem’mie Fells. Breonna Taylor.”

You should go read the entire article for yourselves, honestly.

WNBA’s Big Legal Mess

But whatever you think of trans-related issues and far left-wing political activism in sports, the Clarendon story is a huge legal mess for the WNBA when it comes to establishing league eligibility rules. Clarendon is a woman who identifies as a man and the league allowed her to play, while receiving gender change treatments — likely including testosterone treatments — and referring to her as him in all league press releases, guidebooks, and game notes.

If the league truly believes that gender is malleable, the WNBA has already allowed a man to play in the league.

In order to exclude Freedom and White, the league would have to argue Layshia Clarendon wasn’t actually a man, which directly contradicts the public statements the league has already made celebrating her transition to a man.

.@ClayTravis talks WNBA and Enes Kanter Freedom with @seanhannity. pic.twitter.com/EwYa8IxKQI

— The Clay Travis & Buck Sexton Show (@clayandbuck) August 26, 2026

So if they let a woman who identifies as a man play in the league, how can they now restrict Freedom and White, who say they are men identifying as women? In essence, how does the WNBA argue that only women are eligible to play in the league if they have already permitted, and publicly celebrated, a trans-man playing in the league?

Legally speaking, the WNBA could adopt a policy going forward that only players born as women are eligible, but that rule doesn’t exist today. Presently the WNBA eligibility guidelines say: “Only players who are women are eligible to play in the WNBA.” But the way the league applied its own rules permitted a woman who says she is a man to play. And any change to league eligibility rules today would be occurring after Freedom and White have already declared themselves eligible under the existing rules, likely rendering the eligibility changes unenforceable under the law.

Complicating this situation further, Clarendon didn’t just play as a man identifying as a woman; she was involved in drafting and ratifying the existing WNBA guidelines under the CBA adopted in 2020. This means not only did the WNBA allow her to play after receiving gender surgery, they had to examine the league rules to permit this to occur. Did they issue any legal guidance then? What did the WNBA’s lawyers say about Clarendon’s eligibility as a woman identifying as a man? All of that would be discoverable in a lawsuit in the event the league excluded Freedom and White from eligibility.

What’s more, we know about Clarendon because she spoke out about her gender transition surgery. Has anyone else in the WNBA had the same surgeries and not publicly disclosed them? Are other players currently receiving testosterone as part of a gender treatment plan? If so, are there records of this? Additionally, are there women who are not actually “women,” that is testing as XX chromosomes when assessed for gender? If so, this might explain why the WNBA has refused to adopt the same gender testing standards as the Women’s Tennis Association, the NCAA, and the International Olympic Committee, all of which require women actually be women to participate in their competitions.

Where Does This Leave Us?

The WNBA, based on their treatment of Layshia Clarendon, is in a legally precarious position when it comes to what a woman is and how to define it in their league going forward. The league has four real options:

1. Admit that Clarendon was never a man and was eligible to play in the league because she was born a woman, meaning the league must deny her transition to a man is legitimate and affirm that you are the gender on your birth certificate for purposes of league rules.
2. Admit women who identify as men and men who identify as women into the league, allowing gender identity to govern, not birth gender. This would allow Freedom and White and any other men who identify as women to play in the league.
3. Deny Freedom and White are actually women, meaning the WNBA knows what a woman is. But, again, the challenge here is they have allowed an avowed man to already play in the league and celebrated it.
4. Permit Freedom and White to be entered into the WNBA Draft, but have teams refuse to draft them. The problem here is Freedom and White could then immediately sue, alleging antitrust violations based on the conspired agreement of teams to not draft them, when the players would clearly be the best basketball players available to be drafted.

I think the WNBA is trapped here, their prior actions and public statements have created a legal minefield when it comes to player eligibility. In essence, if a woman pretending to be a man is eligible to play in the league, how they can exclude men pretending to be women?

Other lawyers can analyze this as well, I’d be genuinely curious to hear what they think too. But I believe the WNBA’s treatment of Layshia Clarendon and public pronouncements that a woman who identified as a man was actually a man creates huge legal obstacles for the WNBA going forward when it comes to keep Freedom and White out of the league.

If you’re wondering why the league has been so quiet when it comes to defining a woman, it may well be because the league’s own lawyers have looked at this issue and realized the WNBA is in a deep legal mess.

By publicly embracing a woman pretending to be a man and allowing her to play in the league for multiple years, they’ve opened the door to men identifying as women being eligible too.

Sport & State has shared this article with WNBA officials requesting comment on all the issues raised here. We will update the article if we receive any comments. But don’t hold your breath.