"They need to just let it go. We're just going to do it anyway. They just need to let it go. They need to go ahead and say, 'Ya'll go ahead, smoke it, do what you need to do.'"

And then here is the writer's take on the ban:

"Cro's got a point here. We just had a Super Bowl featuring two teams from states that have legalized the use of weed. And marijuana's status as a banned substance under the NFL's drug policy dates to a time when the country was still in a moral panic over its use. The justification for weed's continued prohibition is (rightly) losing steam.

But let's consider why players might want to use weed, regardless of what commissioner Roger Goodell has to say about it. As former NFL tight end Nate Jackson explains in his book, Slow Getting Up: A Story of NFL Survival from the Bottom of the Pile:

The NFL should remove marijuana from their banned substances list. Don't tell anyone about it: just stop testing for it.
Pain is a big problem in the NFL. Pain management is necessary.

Weed is the least harmful and least addictive of the painkillers players use to cope with the violent demands of the game."