For The Third Season In A Row, NBA Players Will Not Be Tested For Cannabis At Random

For the past two basketball seasons, the National Basketball Association, AKA the NBA, has not been testing players for cannabis use at random. Now, make that three, for the third season in a row, NBA players will be free of random cannabis testing. The first time that the league stopped doing this practice was during the quarantine phase of 2020 when players were in their own “bubble” while playing in Orlando. With this policy still being taken away, it is possible that this could become permanent.

Ben Dowsett stated on Twitter how “League sources: Continuing a theme from the Orlando bubble, NBA players once again will not be randomly tested for cannabis during the 2022-23 season. Cannabis remains on the NBA’s banned substances list, and testing will still be done for probable cause.” This means that unexpected cannabis testing will not happen, unless there is a given reason to do so. A big reason why this is happening is due to the change of opinion and beliefs that many have towards cannabis nowadays. Cannabis is becoming more of a trend and more of something that is not frowned upon. The NBA is even making such a stride to push this idea by having one of their stars, Kevin Durant, partner with a cannabis marketplace to raise awareness of destigmatizing cannabis and showing how it can help with athlete recovery and wellbeing. Not only with the NBA, but there has been a national conversation going on between all of the sports leagues about this exact topic. Let’s take a quick peek into what other sports are doing about cannabis testing.

The MLB has signed to do a partnership with a cannabis brand and has removed cannabis from their “banned substances” list.

Next, the UFC decided that fighters will no longer be punished for cannabis tests that come back positive.

Lastly, the NFL being the sports league to make the largest push towards cannabis destigmatization by making sure that no NFL player is suspended from a game for a positive test for any drug. Players may face a fine instead.

Since sports leagues have such a large following, it is important for them to promote the ways that cannabis can be healing for people and also provide education on the topic. The more influential figures that hop onto this trend, the more that people will be reached and maybe even change their own opinions on cannabis.

Sources: Ben Dowsett, Marijuana Moment

Images: Deadspin, NBA, The Fresh Toast

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Sarah Silverman

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