Cloud feels confident in her resume. She averaged 10.1 points and 5.1 assists for a 27-win New York Liberty team last year. She led the league in assists in 2022 and won a ring in 2019. She was named to three All-Defensive teams (one first- and two second-team selections) in the last seven seasons. Sure, she turned 34 in February, but Cloud believes she\u2019s still in her physical prime.<\/p>\n
Still, the offers didn\u2019t come.<\/p>\n
When the Sky finally made the call to offer Cloud a one-year, $555,000 deal barely a week before the season opener, it felt like a lifeline. Cloud made sense in Chicago as a secondary facilitator for a team looking to revamp its system and culture quickly. But the final fit didn\u2019t soften the blow of those days spent on the outside looking in.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just have extra fuel behind me this year,\u201d Cloud told the Tribune. \u201cThis is the place that I feel like is ready to pour gasoline on that \u2014 in the best way.\u201d<\/p>\n
At first, Cloud\u2019s omission from free agency appeared to be a byproduct of a rushed period of negotiations. But as Cloud remained unsigned, speculation began to swirl that the guard\u2019s lack of a contract was driven by off-the-court concerns \u2014 a suggestion repeatedly stoked by fellow WNBA players.<\/p>\n
An aggregator account on X made a post citing a Front Office Sports report that sources within the league \u201cnegated social media rumors that Cloud is being blackballed because of her activism.\u201d Within minutes, Cloud\u2019s longtime girlfriend and Toronto Tempo forward Isabelle Harrison responded: \u201cThis isn\u2019t true.\u201d<\/p>\n
Harrison later deleted the post, but her statement sparked further speculation from fans. During a livestream on Twitch, Minnesota Lynx guard Courtney Williams and Seattle Storm guard Natisha Hiedeman echoed the same concern.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou know that it ain\u2019t got nothing to do with her basketball ability,\u201d Williams said. \u201cIt gotta be because of the other (stuff).\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Chicago](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/CTC-SKY-PREGAME-12_262816262.jpg\")
Chicago Sky guard Natasha Cloud shoots around during practice on May 20, 2026, at Wintrust Arena. (Eileen T. Meslar\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n
Speculation varied, however, about what exactly the \u201cother stuff\u201d might entail. Cloud often voiced significant criticisms of the league, Commissioner Cathy Engelbert and some team owners during recent negotiations for the new collective bargaining agreement<\/a>. The guard\u2019s willingness to articulate her political beliefs also has earned backlash from detractors.<\/p>\n Cloud is a vocal advocate for Palestinian liberation, writing slogans such as \u201cFeed Gaza\u201d on her sneakers for every game she plays. She held up a sign reading \u201cAbolish ICE\u201d during player introductions for an Unrivaled game this winter and made endorsement advertisements with New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani during last year\u2019s campaign.<\/p>\n The timing of Cloud\u2019s free-agency vacuum drove concern that the guard was being blackballed from the league for her political beliefs. Despite acknowledging the risks taken with vocal advocacy, Cloud said no team or agent ever communicated an explicit concern about her activism or political beliefs.<\/p>\n \u201cNo one\u2019s ever going to admit if that was the case,\u201d Cloud said Wednesday during a news conference before the Sky\u2019s home opener against the Dallas Wings at Wintrust Arena. \u201cI\u2019m sure there are certain organizations that, yeah, I\u2019m not the player for you. I will say what I feel on my heart when it comes to my morals and my values. I am a Christian, so that\u2019s what I stand on and I won\u2019t shy away from it. So it does take a certain organization. \u2026 When you have that ability (to speak out) not only from your organization, from your front office and ownership, it really does make a difference.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cY\u2019all can villainize me all you want, but I just want love and peace. I want people to be able to live a dignified life, no matter where they came from. \u2026 If I\u2019m villainized for that, I don\u2019t think that says a lot about me. I think that\u2019s just a lot about the people villainizing me.\u201d<\/p>\n The root of Cloud\u2019s confusion surrounding free agency is planted in the lack of an offer from the Liberty.<\/p>\n Cloud said that she understood the Liberty\u2019s need to pay the Big Three of Sabrina Ionescu, Jonquel Jones and Breanna Stewart \u2014 each of whom landed maximum deals \u2014 but never felt she received an explanation of why she wasn\u2019t offered a deal.<\/p>\n \u201cYour guess is as good as mine,\u201d Cloud said. \u201cI still haven\u2019t gotten an answer. \u2026 I appreciate all the kind words said about me. I know who I was for that organization, I know who I was for that community, but I still don\u2019t have an answer. Everyone here has been in a relationship where there\u2019s no closure and you just move on. \u2026 I\u2019m in this next relationship and I\u2019m loving life.\u201d<\/p>\n While the lack of interest from the Liberty was confusing, the following weeks of inactivity were baffling to Cloud.<\/p>\n This year\u2019s free-agency period was uniquely truncated, essentially lasting only 13 days because of the duration of CBA negotiations \u2014 and creating a flurry of activity as a result. Cloud acknowledged how \u201cbinding\u201d the new salary cap can be for front offices, forcing teams such as the Golden State Valkyries to offload their draft picks entirely simply to navigate their current salaries. This put the squeeze on veteran players such as Cloud who have put in more than a decade of service in the league.<\/p>\n And a player won\u2019t make sense to every team. Teams such as the Lynx and Las Vegas Aces already had locked down high-level point guard options. Cloud already had a few no-go teams \u2014 she previously pushed hard for a trade out of Connecticut following a trade last spring, and league sources believed she also burned bridges with the Phoenix Mercury, who traded her to the Sun in February 2025.<\/p>\n In addition to these hurdles, Cloud said she was dropped by her agency two days before the WNBA draft \u2014 and days into free agency \u2014 before signing with Fabio Jardine of FirstPick Management, which only added to the tumult of the process.<\/p>\n Cloud was angry. She was hurt. And she was afraid she wouldn\u2019t get a chance to play in the WNBA this season. But through the process, the guard said she tried her best to stay offline and avoid speaking out until she found a new home in the league.<\/p>\n \u201cEveryone thinks I\u2019m a crashout,\u201d Cloud said. \u201cSo I think everyone was expecting me to jaw off and kind of go crazy with the predicament that I was in. If I\u2019m being honest, some of it would have validity for me even being in that position. But that just wasn\u2019t the case. \u2026 A lot of my silence was understanding that I know my value, that I know my worth, I know who I am and I don\u2019t have to speak on it because my game speaks for itself. When it comes down to it, it never made sense to me because my play on the court \u2014 y\u2019all not gonna keep undervaluing what I bring to it.\u201d<\/p>\n For the Sky, Cloud wasn\u2019t on the front office\u2019s early list of free-agent targets for one simple reason \u2014 they didn\u2019t think they needed another point guard.<\/p>\n General manager Jeff Pagliocca entered free agency with a clear-cut priority of signing seven-time All-Star Skylar Diggins<\/a> to take the helm of starting point guard. With Courtney Vandersloot set to return<\/a> eventually from a torn ACL in her right knee<\/a> and a slew of other combo guards, the Sky simply weren\u2019t in the market for a third on-ball guard.<\/p>\n But that changed with time. The Sky landed all of their top targets in free agency. Still, the secondary guard group didn\u2019t offer high confidence in their ability to facilitate the ball without Diggins and Vandersloot on the court. When Cloud remained available in the early days of training camp, coach Tyler Marsh said the internal messaging for the Sky was simple: Go get her.<\/p>\n \u201cI think everyone in the league was (surprised Cloud was available),\u201d Marsh said. \u201cEveryone knows who and what Natasha Cloud is as a player. We\u2019ve been able to learn is who she is as a person and how passionate she is about her teammates, how passionate she is about the game.\u201d<\/p>\n Cloud said she couldn\u2019t stop herself from laughing during her first phone call with Pagliocca, who is known for an incredibly intense style of communication during negotiations. Within minutes, the general manager had sold her \u2014 both on Marsh\u2019s system and on the team\u2019s win-now mentality.<\/p>\n \u201cThese dudes \u2014 they really got some dogs in them,\u201d Cloud told the Tribune. \u201cThey want to win and they\u2019re willing to do whatever. Even Jeff having the balls to call me and sign me when the rest of the league was dragging their feet, I think it speaks as a testament that like \u2014 he really doesn\u2019t give a (expletive) He\u2019s ready to wear it and he\u2019s ready to put his name on the line, and that makes you want to do the same thing too.\u201d<\/p>\n For Cloud, the challenge now is to figure out who she wants to be in Chicago. She averaged 8.3 points and 4.7 assists in her first three games with the Sky, coming off the bench twice before starting in place of the injured Diggins on Sunday. The guard\u2019s role will have to adapt around the returns of Vandersloot and DiJonai Carrington, both of whom are projected to be cleared to play by midsummer.<\/p>\n But while her on-court presence must be malleable at this point of her career, Cloud feels confident in her ability to remain the same person off the court in Chicago.<\/p>\n \u201cMy activism isn\u2019t going to stop,\u201d Cloud said. \u201cThis is my purpose. This is what God\u2019s purpose is for my career. Not just to come out here on an opening night and get a dub but to make sure that people feel seen and shielded and loved and protected. It\u2019s not for everybody. These shoes, they\u2019re hard to fill \u2014 and I say that again very humbly, but it just is what it is.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As the final days of WNBA free agency dragged to a close in April, one question began to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":655109,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[18116,438,72701,2836,82258,7788,4386,99,10712,434,10766],"class_list":["post-655108","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wnba","tag-cathy-engelbert","tag-chicago-sky","tag-courtney-vandersloot","tag-dijonai-carrington","tag-jeff-pagliocca","tag-natasha-cloud","tag-skylar-diggins","tag-sports","tag-tyler-marsh","tag-wnba","tag-zohran-mamdani"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/655108","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=655108"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/655108\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/655109"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=655108"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=655108"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=655108"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Chicago](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/CTC-Z-SKY-CLOUD.jpg\")
Chicago Sky guard Natasha Cloud brings the ball upcourt against the Phoenix Mercury on Friday, May 15, 2026, in Phoenix. (Ross D. Franklin\/AP)<\/p>\n