Travis Kelce makes bold comment about how many NFL players use marijuana

Jan 29, 2020; Miami, Florida, USA; Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce speaks during a press conference for Super Bowl LIV at JW Marriott Turnberry. Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports

NFL players set the field ablaze with their spectacular performances on Sunday, and then they apparently set their joints ablaze too at other times, so says one NFL player.

Travis Kelce was featured in a profile by Vanity Fair for their July/August issue. In the feature, Kelce spoke about many subjects, including how he feels about being underpaid.

Kelce also opened up about his year-long suspension in college.

The Kansas City Chiefs star tight end played at Cincinnati in college from 2008-2012. He redshirted in 2008 and missed the entire 2010 season due to a suspension for failing a drug test. Kelce had smoked weed ahead of the team’s 2010 Sugar Bowl game (for the 2009 season). He failed a drug test that was administered the night before the bowl game.

Kelce told Vanity Fair’s Tom Kludt that by comparison, the NFL’s testing process for marijuana is very easy.

“If you just stop in the middle of July, you’re fine,” Kelce told Kludt of when players need to stop using marijuana in order to pass tests. “A lot of guys stop a week before and they still pass because everybody’s working out in the heat and sweating their tail off. Nobody’s really getting hit for it anymore.”

Kludt added in the story that Kelce estimated that “anywhere from 50 to 80 percent of players in the NFL use cannabis.”

Does that come as a surprise? The 50 percent figure is not too surprising, but the 80 percent estimate is very high. There’s a reason why there was such a big push to change the drug test policy; players want to be able to use their cannabis.

Hearing how easy it is to pass the drug tests makes you wonder how guys ever fail them.