The National Basketball Association (NBA) and the National Basketball Players Association (NBPA) jointly agreed to suspend random cannabis testing through the 2020-2021 season. The NBA also didn’t test its players during the hiatus between last season.
“Due to the unusual circumstances in conjunction with the pandemic, we have agreed with the NBPA to suspend random testing for marijuana for the 2020-21 season and focus our random testing program on performance-enhancing products and drugs of abuse,” said NBA spokesperson Mike Bass.
NBA reporter Ben Dowsett reported the decision was a safety measure related to COVID-19 because the league wants to reduce unnecessary contact. “We’re not going to expose our players to unnecessary risks,” Michele Roberts, executive director of the NBPA, said “And it is not necessary to know whether our players are positive for marijuana.”
Many NBA players, both current and former, have voiced their opinions on cannabis. Kevin Durant has said he wants to see cannabis removed from the NBA’s banned substances list eventually, however, Roberts believes the temporary suspension is a sign of things to come. She believes the NBA will follow other professional leagues who have changed their policies towards cannabis.
“I feel sometimes that, it’s uncool that the league still tests for marijuana. And I think that’s not exactly where the state of the science on marijuana is,” Silver said in 2019. “I think that, clearly to the extent it has medicinal qualities, those are things that we should be looking at. Where it’s in terms of pain relief, of course. And that’s something that’s being studied, not just by us. The NFL recently announced they’re studying that issue, as well. And we should look at it.”
Immediately after the news broke, JR Smith, NBA player and known cannabis advocate began trending on Twitter.
