Tyrese Maxey got drug tested after posting a summer workout video. Coincidence? He isn’t sure.
Maxey joked on "X" that comments about his off-season strength training led to him being drug-tested.
Weeks after signing a max extension, Tyrese Maxey is in the gym, posting videos of his summer workouts ahead of a much-anticipated Sixers season now that the team has added Paul George.
Between Maxey’s press conference, in which some fans remarked he looked very swole, and a recent video of Maxey working out, fans were impressed with his insane physique.
Maxey practiced his ballhandling in summer workouts, but all fans could focus on were his muscles.
Who wasn’t impressed? The NBA, who Maxey joked on “X” that he was drug-tested shortly after the video was released because of everyone’s comments and jokes about his offseason strength training.
Despite popular perception, the NBA maintains that players are subjected to drug tests at random. The league “subjects each player to no more than nine random, unannounced drug tests during each season and offseason — up to six urine tests and three blood tests.”
Those decisions are made “according to a random player selection procedure by a third-party organization,” per the CBA. There is a clause in the CBA for players to get tested “based on reasonable cause at any time,” but the NBA has never confirmed its use. But that hasn’t stopped players and fans from speculating that the process is less transparent than it appears.
Donovan Mitchell and Damian Lillard both called out the NBA for drug testing them after their 71-point games. Maxey is just the latest player to joke about the league policy. Thunder guard Alex Caruso was randomly drug tested in the offseason in 2019 while with the Lakers after an altered photo of him began to circulate on social media.