CrimeBeat!: Supplemental Edition

Continuing the tradition of great Crime News I Can Use breaking just after I put up my post, news out of Dallas today broke that a substance-abuse suspension was not for the substance everyone thought it was.

In case you missed it, Cowboys linebacker, serial AARP member and Friend of the Show Rolando McClain was allegedly suspended on June 30th by the NFL under its substance-abuse policy for ten games. Not having been given any additional details, and this being Today’s NFL, I think we all assumed that it was for smoking Devil Weed. We know it’s widespread, and we know the NFL has a hard-on for smokers, tokers and assorted “cool guys”.

But no, my friends. No. Word today is that McClain was suspended for Waltzing The Grimace. That’s right, another tragic victim of THE PURPLE DRAAAANK!

Seriously though- opioid addiction is a huge problem in America at large and among football players in particular, given that their job is to do things that could cause them to need painkillers. I have nothing but sympathy for those who go down that path.

That being said, PURPLE DRAAAAANK! It’s inherently funnier than most other kinds of drug abuse, because it involves large quantities of soda and perhaps a jolly rancher for ‘flava’. And apparently all that sugar can really get to you- McClain allegedly gained something like 40 pounds in the offseason. Someone get Tony Romo a specimen jar!

My last question is this: in several of the news articles, the author specifies that McClain “tested positive for purple drank”. How the hell do they know that it was purple drank instead of just traditional codeine abuse? Does the food dye pass though? Is there some compound in Sprite that the government and The New World Order Conspiracy can detect and track in our urine?