Mark Cuban Explains Why He’s Traded Players Who Smoke Too Much Weed

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It took the NBA a bit longer than it probably should have to acknowledge marijuana use among players isn’t really a huge deal, but any heavy smokers who play for the Dallas Mavericks may want to try to hide their habit from owner Mark Cuban based on his feelings about that particular topic.

There are plenty of notable names who’ve admitted to regularly partaking in that particular pastime and suggested they’re far from the only people doing exactly that; J.R. Smith said “The Bubble” was basically a massive hotbox, while Kevin Durant strongly suggested he reeked of weed while lobbying Adam Silver to officially remove it from the league’s list of banned substances.

While I don’t really have any hard evidence to back this up, I don’t think it’s a stretch to assume most guys aren’t stepping onto the court stoned, and even though I feel most teams don’t have a problem with their players smoking when they’re off the clock, there’s at least one owner who frowns upon people who take things a bit too far.

Cuban recently sat down for an interview for The Pat Bev Pod during a conversation where he offered his insight into marijuana use in the NBA, and he admitted it’s played a role in his decision to trade players while offering a pretty solid explanation for his rationale.

Here’s what he had to say:

“Teams have their own culture, right?

If you get some young dudes on there who are just figuring out what the team or NBA culture is, and you’ve got one dude that you walk down the hall in the hotel and you know he’s on that floor and there’s no doubt about it, and then all of a sudden these other kids start picking up on it. 

You see them coming out of their room. You see them a little bit red-eyed coming to practice all of a sudden. You don’t want them going down that road. 

Everybody smokes, right? It’s not about that, but there’s smoking, there’s how powerful the s*** you’re doing is, and then there’s how much you do.

If you get past that level and there’s a chance you might drag somebody with you, you got to look at the bigger picture.”

I don’t think that’s a totally unreasonable stance to take, but I’d be remiss if I didn’t include the words “More like Narc Cuban” somewhere in this article.