By Former Pittsburgh Steeler Le’Veon Bell said on a recent podcast that he would score a touchdown and win the game, even if he smoked cannabis beforehand.
Now a free agent, Bell briefly played for the Kansas City Chiefs, Baltimore Ravens and Tampa Bay Buccaneers after leaving the Pittsburgh Steelers, the true home of his professional football career. CBS news report On a recent podcast, Bell detailed how often he smoked, even before a game.
Bell played for the Steelers from 2013 to 2017, averaging 5,336 rushing yards, 2,660 receiving yards and 5.2 yards per touchdown. Bell was also named All-Pro twice and had three 1,000-yard rushing seasons. In 2015 and his 2016, he was named one of his NFL Top 100. He clearly scored many of the stoned touchdowns in haste.
upon Episode 30 On the podcast Steel Here, Bell explained how he smoked cannabis before his best Steelers performance.
“Looking back, that’s what I did,” Bell said. “When I was playing football, I used to smoke. Even before games, I would smoke and go out and run for 150, two (touchdowns).”
In 2019, Bell signed a four-year, $52.5 million deal with the New York Jets, but the deal didn’t last long. Bell hasn’t played professional football since the 2021 season, but he has no plans to retire from the league anytime soon. A contract dispute forced him out of his contract with the Steelers, but he hopes to eventually retire with the Steelers.
“It was literally a guarantee. They never stepped out of there and I never stepped out of there. I didn’t want to leave Pittsburgh,” Bell said. “At the end of the day, that was where I was. I was drafted there. I was a Pittsburgh guy.”
In 2021, the National Football League (NFL) changed its guidelines significantly, so players will only be tested for cannabis once at the start of training camp.
“I’m retiring in Pittsburgh,” Bell said. “But before that, you might be thinking, ‘Let me do some carries in preseason so I can show you guys something.'”
NFL and Pot Policy
The NFL, like most other major sports leagues, is relaxing its cannabis policies. Last year, the NFL went one step further by awarding funding to two cannabis research initiatives focused on the effectiveness of cannabis as a therapeutic for pain management.
The NFL is currently investigating cannabis-based drugs for treating pain, given that alternative therapies are opioids. In a February 1, 2022 press release, the NFL said, $1 million to two different researchers and University of California, San Diego (UCSD) and University of Regina (UR) is located in Canada. Both research groups will focus on how cannabinoids can help in general pain management, and will also conduct several other targeted studies.
NFL-NFLPA joint pain management board (PMC) called for research proposals in June 2021, seeking researchers to support PMC’s knowledge of pain management and exercise performance. The committee received a total of 106 applications, which were narrowed down to 10 finalists by the NFL Research and Innovation Commission.
Players are likely smoking during that time. This echoes what is said about other major sports leagues such as the National Basketball Association (NBA). (Jay Williams estimated that) 80% of NBA players smoke cannabisAl Harrington speculates that the figure is a little higher. )
