Pro Athletes Are Already Using Cannabis. Sports Orgs Just Won’t Talk About It.

A recent NFL-funded study published in Sports Health found that elite contact-sport athletes from the NFL, NBA, NHL, NCAA, and other leagues deliberately use cannabis for pain management, sleep, recovery, and mental health support. Despite this, sports organizations provide little to no evidence-based education, leaving athletes to figure it out through teammates, internet searches, and trial and error.

A new peer-reviewed study has confirmed what a lot of people in the cannabis space have known for a long time. Professional athletes use cannabis. Not accidentally, not casually. Deliberately, and with a clear understanding of what they want from it.

The study, titled “Inside the Minds of Professional and Elite Athletes: A Qualitative Exploration of Perspectives on Cannabinoid Use in Contact Sports,” was published in the journal Sports Health in July 2026. It was written by researchers at the University of Saskatchewan and the University of Regina, and it was partially funded by the NFL-NFLPA Pain Management Committee. Read that last part again. The NFL helped pay for this.

What the researchers found should prompt some serious self-reflection from sports organizations at every level. Athletes are managing pain, improving sleep, supporting recovery, and addressing their mental health with cannabis, often in secret, often without guidance, and often while the people responsible for their healthcare look the other way.

What the Study Actually Found

Researchers conducted in-depth interviews with 10 current and former elite contact-sport athletes across the NFL, NBA, NHL, AHL, NCAA, and USports. The athletes ranged in age from 19 to 48 years old, with an average career length of 5.1 years.

Five major themes came out of those interviews. Athletes use cannabis. Education and knowledge are lacking. Fear of judgment and punishment is pervasive. Cannabis use happens “hiding in plain sight.” And the legal and regulatory landscape shapes everything.

Athletes described cannabis use for pain relief, mental health, recovery, sleep, and even neuroprotection following concussions. One athlete said cannabis was “far better than taking any sort of pain killer” from a long-term perspective. Another reported sleeping better on cannabis than on Tylenol with codeine. These aren’t fringe opinions. They reflect a pattern of intentional, informed self-care by people who know their bodies extremely well.

The study’s central conclusion puts it plainly: “Elite contact sport athletes use cannabis intentionally for recreational, therapeutic, and recovery purposes but face systemic barriers related to misinformation, stigma, and inconsistent policy guidance.”

Why Athletes Are Turning to Cannabis for Recovery and Pain

The motivations athletes shared in this study weren’t surprising to anyone paying attention to the research. Cannabis has documented potential for reducing pain and inflammation, improving sleep quality, and supporting mental health. Studies published in peer-reviewed journals have shown cannabinoids may reduce anxiety and depression, and early evidence points to potential neuroprotective properties that are especially relevant for contact-sport athletes dealing with repeated head impacts.

Athletes in the study described deliberate decisions around dosing, timing, and delivery method. Many chose edibles, tinctures, gummies, and topicals over smoking, citing respiratory concerns. Some balanced CBD and THC depending on the effect they were looking for. Others adjusted frequency in-season to avoid any impact on performance.

This is not reckless use. It’s methodical. One athlete summed it up well: “As a professional athlete, you always wanna try to recover as fast as possible.” Cannabis, for many of them, fit that goal better than the pharmaceutical alternatives they were being offered.

How Does Cannabis Drug Testing Work for Professional Athletes?

This was one of the biggest knowledge gaps the study identified, and it’s a genuinely important question. Athletes reported being unsure how long cannabis stays in their system relative to training schedules and league testing windows. That uncertainty created anxiety, and in some cases, kept them from using cannabis at all even when it was no longer banned.

Here’s where things stand across major leagues:

The NBA removed cannabis from its banned substances list in 2023. The WNBA followed suit in 2026. The NCAA voted to remove cannabis from its banned list for Division I athletes in 2024. The NFL reformed its policy in 2024, reducing fines and raising the allowable THC threshold. The UFC removed cannabis from its modified banned list in late 2023, though California State Athletic Commission rules still apply in certain events.

The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) still prohibits THC in competition, with a threshold of 150 nanograms per milliliter in urine. WADA only tests in-competition, which means out-of-competition use is generally not subject to sanction. The US Anti-Doping Agency has publicly criticized this policy as unfair.

Despite all these shifts, athletes in the study still described confusion about the rules and no reliable source of information to turn to. That’s the core problem.

The Education Gap. What Sports Organizations Are Getting Wrong

Here’s the part that should bother everyone. As leagues softened their cannabis policies, they didn’t replace the old “just say no” framework with anything useful. Athletes went from being told cannabis was prohibited to being told, effectively, nothing.

“With sports leagues removing cannabis from the banned substance list, athletes increasingly rely on personal experience or peer advice to guide them, with minimal formal education ever provided,” the study states.

The education athletes did receive from teams and governing bodies was described as “largely one-sided, focused on negative effects,” rarely explaining the actual rationale behind the rules. Notably, one athlete recalled completing a mandatory educational module as a sanction while actively using cannabis, and then watching the same video again the following year after another positive test. The module changed nothing because it never addressed what the athlete actually needed to know.

Nearly 90% of medical students report feeling ill-equipped to recommend cannabis therapies, according to research cited in the study. That knowledge gap extends into sports medicine. Athletes reported that team medical staff had little cannabis knowledge and even less interest in acquiring it. Many staff members grew up during the War on Drugs era and still carried that framing into their clinical work. The result was a complete breakdown in athlete-clinician communication around a substance that many athletes were already using.

What Evidence-Based Cannabis Education for Athletes Should Cover

Athletes in the study were clear about what they actually wanted. They wanted information on recovery applications, sleep effects, pain management, how cannabis interacts with training schedules, what drug testing policies mean in practice, and guidance on product quality and dosing. None of that is unreasonable. All of it is answerable with existing science.

The researchers offered five concrete directions for sports organizations:

First, cannabis education tailored specifically to athletes and sports medicine professionals. Second, policies harmonized across leagues and grounded in current evidence. Third, open and nonjudgmental communication between athletes and medical staff. Fourth, active reduction of cannabis stigma across sport. Fifth, continued investment in research on cannabis and athletic health outcomes.

What that looks like in practice is preseason presentations on cannabinoids, accessible information on delivery methods and onset times, guidance on THC detection windows relative to testing schedules, and frank conversations about when cannabis may or may not serve an athlete’s health goals. Not abstinence messaging wrapped in a compliance module. Actual healthcare.

The Alcohol Double Standard Nobody Wants to Address

The study documented something athletes have quietly known for years. Alcohol is accepted, celebrated even, in sport culture. Heavy drinking after games is normal. Cannabis remains stigmatized. Athletes were more afraid to ask their team doctors about cannabis than about alcohol, despite the documented risks of both.

“Normalizing alcohol while stigmatizing cannabis creates confusion and erodes trust,” the study states.

Several athletes in the study described switching from alcohol to cannabis precisely because of the negative effects of drinking on their recovery and performance. One athlete noted feeling “way less in control” of their thoughts and actions after drinking compared to cannabis, and reported significantly faster recovery without alcohol. The culture hasn’t caught up to that reality yet, but it’s starting to.

What Needs to Change

The study’s findings are a case for action, not just reflection. Sports organizations that have removed cannabis from their banned substance lists without replacing the old framework with anything helpful have created a new kind of problem. Athletes are left making healthcare decisions based on peer advice and internet research because the people responsible for their wellbeing are not equipped to help them.

League silence does not prevent cannabis use. It just moves it underground, removes oversight, and increases exposure to unregulated products. That is worse for athlete health, not better.

The answer is not to reverse policy. It is to build the educational infrastructure that should have come with the policy changes in the first place. Cannabis is legal in a growing number of states and across Canada. Athletes live and train in those markets. They are going to engage with cannabis whether leagues have a framework for it or not. The question is whether they do so with guidance or without it.

Frequently Asked Questions

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