Cannabis companies are gearing up to grab some attention at the Super Bowl in Arizona, which is expected to be seen by 100 million viewers. Former Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Jim McMahon has already staked his claim.
Revenant, a cannabis brand founded in 2021 by McMahon and former NFL players Kyle Turley and Eben Britton, will be hosting a celebrity golf tournament to raise funds for the Gridiron Greats Assistance Fund, a nonprofit set up to help retired NFL players and their families in financial need. The event will be the first open cannabis-consumption golf tournament around the Super Bowl, which is being held in the fully weed-legal state of Arizona.
“This will be the first time at a Super Bowl golf event where cannabis will be readily consumed,” McMahon told the Phoenix Business Journal. “Everybody there will probably not be a cannabis user, and that is fine. I’m trying to invite guys I know who are good guys and like to have a good time.”
McMahon, Turley and Britton, like so many athletes who play contact sports, share similar stories of chronic pain, addiction to prescription meds and desperation for safe pain relief. All three have said that cannabis not only helped them battle their addictions but also helped with pain management, sleep and to improve their quality of life.
During McMahon’s career, which included three seasons with the Eagles in the early 1990s, he became addicted to pain meds to the point that he was taking up to 100 Percocet pills a month, which he said almost killed him. He calls cannabis a “godsend.”
Turley, who played five seasons with the New Orleans Saints suffered from chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), a brain condition linked to repeated head injuries and blows to the head. Turley has said in media interviews that his CTE symptoms subsided when he began using cannabis.
Offensive lineman Eben Britton famously told the New York Post in 2016 that he not only smoked weed regularly as a player but also was high during NFL games on three occasions. He also said that “over 50 percent and it could be as high as 75 percent” of NFL players use cannabis.
Hence, Revenant’s brand message is focused on athletes.
“Our goal is to utilize our platform to send a strong message to the NFL, and other sports organizations that fail to recognize cannabis for medicinal purposes,” McMahon told the Journal.
“Throughout our NFL careers and retirement, myself, Kyle Turley, and Eben Britton have witnessed first-hand the damaging effects of opioids and other harmful prescription medications on the bodies and minds of not only ourselves but fellow athletes alike.” (Full Story)