Scotti

Larry Sanders walked away from $21,935,296 of his $44 million NBA contract after the league suspended him for marijuana, the same drug it took off its banned list in 2023. In the summer of 2013 the Milwaukee Bucks gave Sanders a four-year, $44 million extension. He had been the 15th pick in the 2010 draft. The first season of the deal went badly. In November 2013 he hurt his thumb in a fight at a Milwaukee nightclub and needed surgery. In April 2014 the NBA suspended him five games after his third positive test for marijuana. The league only suspends a player after the third positive test. In December 2014 he left the team for personal reasons. In January 2015 the league suspended him again, this time without pay for at least 10 games and until he completed a treatment program. He missed 12 games and lost about $1.2 million in salary. In February 2015 he and the Bucks agreed to a buyout. He kept $9,005,882 for that season and $13.059 million more, which Milwaukee spread over seven years at $1,865,546 a year through 2021-22. He gave up $21,935,296. On Gilbert Arenas's show No Chill, Sanders explained how he saw it: "I didn't feel like a human. I felt more like a product in a lot of ways, and very disposable." "My most consistent year of smoking weed and playing was when I averaged three blocks in a double-double. But I was being penalized for that on the other end." He said the alternatives he was offered were pills: "They have residual effects on my mental that y'all don't gotta deal with." "I was smoking weed consistently, averaging three blocks in a double-double, and then summertime comes and they're like, you got to go to rehab for 90 days." The NBA paused marijuana testing for three seasons starting in 2020. In 2023 the new collective bargaining agreement removed it from the banned list entirely. The case against Sanders: He signed the extension knowing the rules. He failed four tests, got into a nightclub fight in the first month of the deal and left the team in the middle of the season. The Bucks still paid him about $22 million for a contract he chose not to finish. The case for Sanders: He says he was treating anxiety and depression with a substance the NBA no longer bans. He lost about $1.2 million in pay for it, then gave up almost $22 million more when he left. Players today face no penalty for the same thing. So which is it: a player who broke the rules and walked out on a $44 million commitment, or a player punished for something the league itself later decided was fine? Is it fair that he lost $21.9 million over weed?