Should NFL reconsider stance on marijuana?
By Dani Bostick
In Alaska, Colorado, Oregon, Washington, and the District of Columbia, recreational use of marijuana is legal. In two dozen other states, medical use of marijuana is allowed. In the NFL, however, testing positive for THC lands a player in a substance abuse intervention program and subsequent positive tests lead to increasingly long suspensions without pay.
Most recently, Pittsburgh Steelers breakout wide receiver Martavis Bryant was suspended for four games for using marijuana. Cleveland Browns receiver Josh Gordon is suspended indefinitely for continuing to test positive for the drug. Countless other players have placed in the same substance abuse program as players who abuse meth, cocaine, and heroin for using a drug that is legal in several states and has documented therapeutic benefits for pain, anxiety, and other maladies. In some ways, marijuana is less dangerous than many of the most commonly prescribed painkillers and alcohol.
Is it time for the NFL to revisit its policy on marijuana? The league and the players union, the NFLPA already has in the 2014 collective bargaining agreement both parties endorsed. Now, a player can have up to 35 parts per billion in his system instead of a threshold of 15 parts per billion. Compare that to the World Anti-Doping Agency standards that allow athletes to have up to 150 parts per billion in their system before it counts as a failed test.
Marijuana is still illegal on a federal level and employers have the right to create and enforce policies about drug use. Nonetheless, treating marijuana use almost identically to other more dangerous, addictive, and harmful drugs seems unnecessarily harsh.
The NFL has two separate policies for performance-enhancing substances and recreational drugs. Clearly if a drug gives a player an unfair advantage, it can compromise the integrity of the game. Hence, six-game suspensions and longer bans for subsequent violations serve a purpose – they are both a deterrent and a fair consequence for cheating.
Marijuana does not enhance performance, and it can provide relief from both pain and anxiety in an arguably safer and more gentle way than opioid painkillers (such as Vicodin) and benzodiazepines (such as Valium), both of which are addictive and have been proven to have adverse long-term effects. Even Commissioner Roger Goodell has indicated he is hope to endorsing the use of medical marijuana in the league, saying via USA Today, “I’m not a medical expert. We will obviously follow medicine and if they determine this could be a proper usage in any context, we will consider that.”
NFL players who test positive for marijuana end up stigmatized and drug users for partaking of a substance that is legal recreationally in four states and medically in many others. For repeated violations, they can also end up facing draconian consequences more stringent than the ones in place for egregious personal misconduct.
Workplace policies are part of most organizations, but it could be time for the NFL and NFLPA to revisit the severity of consequences for marijuana. Since the NFL warns players about the testing date and gives them time to get clean, passing a drug test is more indicative of strong executive functioning and planning skills, and less of an indication of player’s abstinence from weed.
Next: Indefinite suspension