Heat’s Beasley headed to rehab

Miami Heat forward Michael Beasley has checked himself into a unidentified rehab center apparently at the behest of the team. This action comes after a weekend full of troubling Twitter posts by the athlete in which the young NBA star seemed to have threatened his own life. Really though this is another act in a display of the NBA’s growing image problem. It is also not the first time Beasley has been involved in a situation regarding drugs.

Back in 2008 while attending the NBA Rookie symposium Beasley was in a room with fellow rookie Derrick Rose where some marijuana was found. When NBA security came to the room Beasley slipped out a different door. Later when Heat President Pat Riley found out about his involvement he made the young forward come forward and apologize. The NBA fined Beasley 50 grand for his involvement.

This is the main image problem with the NBA. There are far to many heavily tattooed, drug smoking thug types that are not the kind of people mainstream America wants to watch. These are the kind of people most American work hard to avoid, not pay big money too see in person, or invest time in watching on TV.

With that being said I think we should commend Beasley on taking a step toward improving his life, and getting rid of his vices. It is a worthy effort and I think most sports fans will welcome him back to the league after spending sometime to work on himself.