Former Baltimore Ravens and Chicago Bears linebacker Brendon Ayanbadejo says teammates smoked marijuana ahead of one of his two Super Bowls.
Ayanbadejo did not identify which players or even which team was using the drug in a podcast for Fox Sports.
Ayanbadejo played for the Bears in Super Bowl XLI after the 2006 season and the Ravens in Super Bowl XLVII last season, but he would not reveal which year the incident took place.
"I'm not going to say which Super Bowl it was, but I just remember getting off the elevator one night -- it was early on in the [Super Bowl] week, just to start the week off -- and all of the sudden I just got hit over the head with fumes of marijuana on the entire floor of the hotel that the team was staying on. ... I could just imagine there were a few young guys just toking it up in more than one room."
Ayanbadejo, who did not play in the NFL this season, said he was surprised his teammates would use marijuana days before the Super Bowl.
"I was like, 'Man, this is the week of the Super Bowl and you're just going in?'" Ayanbadejo said. "So then I was looking around, and I'm like, 'OK, where is the security?' I looked, and for some reason we didn't have regular police. Coach was smart enough to have rent-a-cops on our floor instead of regular police like we usually do."
Marijuana has been a topic of discussion this week as the Super Bowl features two teams from states to recently legalize the drug for recreational use.
Medicinal marijuana is legal in 20 states and the District of Columbia, and Seattle Seahawks coach Pete Carroll agreed with the notion that the NFL should look into allowing players to use marijuana for medicinal purposes.
"I would say that we have to explore and find ways to make our game a better game and take care of our players in whatever way possible," Carroll said at a news conference Monday after his team's first practice of Super Bowl week. "Regardless of what other stigmas might be involved, we have to do this because the world of medicine is doing this."
Marijuana remains on the NFL's banned substances list, and two members of the Seahawks' secondary -- cornerbacks Brandon Browner and Walter Thurmond -- have served drug suspensions this season. Browner's suspension is ongoing.