NBA IS TROUBLED BY MARIJUANA USE

Pro basketball: The league has formally proposed to the players' union that
the drug be placed on its list of banned substances along with cocaine and
heroin

As an NBA all-star in the 1960s and 1970s, Washington Wizards General
Manager Wes Unseld said he watched players smoke marijuana and, as a
consequence, "act weird." How weird? "It's like the old joke that goes: A
guy's watching a football game with 60,000 people. He sees the team get
into the huddle and he swears that they're talking about him," Unseld said.
"You know, that kind of stuff."

Marijuana was not a concern of the league's back then. But a generation
later, as the NBA has grown into a global, star-powered industry with an
average annual player salary of $2.2 million and marketing offices from
Melbourne to Mexico City, the issue of marijuana use has attracted the
attention of league executives.

Since last summer four high-profile NBA players have been involved in
marijuana-related criminal cases. The latest involves one of the most
popular players on Unseld's team: Forward Chris Webber, 24, who recently,
after being stopped by police on suspicion of speeding, was charged with
three misdemeanors, including possession of marijuana.

"I suspect it's a problem in the league," NBA deputy commissioner Russ
Granik said in a recent interview, after Webber was arrested. But Granik
said he has no evidence to support his suspicions of marijuana abuse in the
390-player league. "If I did I wouldn't tell you," he said from his office
above New York's Fifth Avenue. "But I don't have any facts and figures."

The NBA has formally proposed to the players' union, the National
Basketball Players Association, that marijuana be placed on the league's
list of banned substances along with cocaine and heroin and that players be
tested for marijuana use. The NBA is the only one of the four major sports
leagues that does not list marijuana as a prohibited substance.

"I'm sure the fan would like to know that players on the court are not
playing under the influence of any drugs," Granik said. As for testing
players, "We've made it plain to the union . . . we would be perfectly
willing to have the league office and club (employees) tested on a similar
basis as long as it didn't violate state laws," Granik said.

Under the NBA's drug agreement, jointly negotiated by the league and union,
players can be disciplined for using or selling cocaine or heroin. Only
rookies are subject to mandatory testing for illegal drug use, and
sanctions range from mandatory treatment for first-time offenders to
expulsion from the league. Marijuana users can be disciplined by the NBA
commissioner, David Stern, but only if their use resulted in a criminal
conviction.

This weekend in New York during the NBA All-Star break, union
representatives from the 29 teams are scheduled to discuss the league's
proposal for the first time as a group.

"It's an issue that we intend to spend a great deal of time on at our
meeting," said Billy Hunter, the union's executive director. "What I hope
to do is get a consensus from the players as to what they think our policy
should be with regard to marijuana usage."

Hunter contends, however, that few, if any, NBA players are using
marijuana. "This is a problem only in the sense that it seems to get so
much notoriety and media attention," said Hunter a former U.S. attorney for
the Northern District of California.

The notoriety comes largely from criminal cases over the past year
involving the four players-- Philadelphia's Allen Iverson, Toronto's Marcus
Camby, Portland's Isaiah Rider and Washington's Webber--and from a New York
Times story last October that asserted that 60% to 70% of all NBA players
smoke marijuana and drink excessively.

The Times said its story was based on conversations with more than two
dozen players, former players, agents and basketball executives. "If they
tested for pot, there would be no league," former Phoenix Suns guard
Richard Dumas, who was banned from the league for drug and alcohol use, was
quoted as saying. "Weed is something guys grow up doing, and there's no
reason for them to stop."

None of the six current NBA players quoted in the story said they used
marijuana themselves or named players who did.

"When you say, 'What's the percentage (of players who use marijuana)?' all
I know is that four people have been apprehended," Hunter said last week.
"There's a tendency to want to (lump) guys together and say: "Well, if two
or three are smoking then more of them must be.' "

Hunter added, "I think there's a tendency to say that because a lot of
these guys dress in the idiom or style that young kids, at least minority
kids, dress that we've now got a . . . gang-related association."

Iverson, the 1996-97 NBA rookie of the year, pleaded no contest last year
to a concealed weapon charge, and a marijuana possession charge was
dropped. Rider pleaded no contest to a marijuana possession charge, and
Camby avoided prosecution on a possession charge by agreeing to do
community service.

Webber was stopped recently while driving his 1998 Lincoln Navigator sport
utility vehicle in Prince George's County, Md. He eventually was charged
with second-degree assault, resisting arrest and marijuana possession. The
butt of a marijuana cigarette and other marijuana residue was found in his
vehicle, according to the charging documents.

The NBA's drug policy is a subject some players don't want to touch.
Recently, before a Washington-Portland game at MCI Center, four Wizards
players, including Webber, declined to discuss any aspect of the program.

"I'm not talking about anything that involves that," said Juwan Howard, the
Wizards' union representative.

"I play basketball," forward Tracy Murray said. "I'm only going to answer
questions about basketball."

In the opposing team's dressing room, Portland's Rider said, when asked
about the drug policy: "I don't want to talk about nothing like that.
Nothing. Interview's over, man."

But Golden State Warriors guard Muggsy Bogues said in a telephone interview
last week, "Marijuana is a drug, and it doesn't belong in the profession .
. . . If it starts to become an issue, it needs to be addressed. It becomes
a stigma (on the league), its image and identity."

NBA and union executives are mightily concerned about the league's image.
In the late 1970s and early 1980s, when the NBA's image was damaged by a
series of cocaine-related arrests, the league and union agreed something
had to be done. The result was a drug program--much like the one in effect
now--that at the time was widely considered the toughest and most
comprehensive in sports.

In 1996, during negotiations for the latest collective bargaining
agreement, the league unsuccessfully tried to update the drug policy. The
league and union agreed instead to "use their respective best efforts" to
negotiate a new drug agreement before the start of the 1997-98 season.

Last January, the NBA sent the union a 40-page proposal that included
adding marijuana to the list of banned substances. The proposal "doesn't
emphasize punishment like our current drug program," Granik said.

Hunter said he has not responded to the proposal because it is largely
punitive. He said it calls for a five-game suspension for first-time
offenses involving marijuana, six months for a second offense and a
lifetime ban for any player who distributes marijuana.

"For the most part, our players are pretty exemplary," Hunter said. "But
for whatever reason a pretty graphic picture has been drawn that gives the
impression that everybody in the league is smoking marijuana."

Hunter said he is confident there is limited marijuana use because players
have denied using the drug in conversations with union employees.

"We have what's called a player programs unit," he said. "We employ six
former NBA players, retired vets who are assigned to the 29 teams. They
visit those teams with a couple of drug experts and put on programs about
use, the consequences, etc. And in the course of doing that they also
conduct surveys to try to determine who, if anybody, is using marijuana."

Asked how these surveys are conducted, Hunter said the six union employees,
"just ask" players if they use marijuana.

"Based on our efforts, I guess what we've come up with is: The guys that
got apprehended (for) smoking marijuana is the extent of the numbers (of
players who use marijuana). Everybody else is denying usage."

Copyright Los Angeles Times