Former NFL DL Derek Wolfe Says He Used to Take Adderall, Mushrooms Before Games

Former NFL defensive end Derek Wolfe apparently had an unusual pregame routine during his nine-year career.

"Before games, I was taking microdoses. ... I'm f--king taking mushrooms and Adderall before I play," Wolfe said on The Joe Rogan Experience (h/t Sean Beckwith of Deadspin).

"Dude, the f--king focus is out of control," he added. "I would just, like, before games, I would get myself pissed off—so I just would start thinking about my childhood, all the s--t I went through as a kid. And it would f--king get me into this rage mode. It was like this crazy controlled rage."

Wolfe did earn a four-game suspension in 2015 for violating the league's policy on performance-enhancing drugs, but he made 122 regular-season appearances during his lengthy NFL career.

The 33-year-old isn't the first NFL player to admit to taking drugs before games. Josh Gordon said in 2017 that he smoked weed and drank before games and had something in his system "probably every game of his career."

The use of mushrooms and Adderall is still an unorthodox combination that hopefully isn't replicated by other players, given potential harmful effects and limited studies about the combination.

Wolfe found plenty of success on the field, totaling 34 sacks across eight seasons with the Denver Broncos and one with the Baltimore Ravens. He was a starter for the 2015 Broncos squad that won the Super Bowl.