10 April 17-April 23, 2025 miaminewtimes.com | browardpalmbeach.com NEW TIMES | MUSIC | CAFE | CULTURE | NIGHT+DAY | NEWS | LETTERS | CONTENTS | know you met me. If you played against me, you’re gonna know you played against me.” Unlike other companies that launch a weed brand with celebrities or athletes sim- ply by renaming an existing strain, Kohen says the Flowery wanted to craft a unique strain for Haslem. “With U.D, it’s so natural,: How do you do a strain or brand for U.D.? It has to be real. We call him the OG, then we chose an OG strain,” Kohen says of the product, an indica strain. that, per the description on the Flowery’s website, is “a special mix of the tightly held Motorbreath #4 & #1 bringing OG and Kush flavors to the forefront.... It brings a heavy OG Kush effect that is old-school in every way: Heavy behind the eyes with a euphoric de- scent.” Haslem, who considers himself a “mari- juana snob,” says he personally tested an ar- ray of samples and set out to understand the science behind them before he found the per- fect strain. “They were patient with me. They took my feedback,” he says. “There are things I don’t know. At the end of the day, I was buy- ing weed in the hood in five-dollar nickel bags. Understanding the science was them introducing me to that. I had a chance to go down to the warehouse. I cut crop. I hurt my damn back. They didn’t tell me i wasn’t sup- posed to cut crop. My Rolex was sticky as hell. I thought I was going to have to pawn it. I didn’t know if this shit was going to be worth anything anymore.” The strain officially launched last year — on 4/20 — with its own logo and merch, in- cluding a T-shirt, a jacket, and a fanny pack. “Good Old-Fashioned Flower” Asked for his own description of 40 OG, Has- lem says it’s an OG cross strain that will re- quire the user to sit their ass down. “That’s what I’m doing when I’m smok- ing it,” he tells New Times.”I’m sitting my ass down. I’m relaxing. I’m chilling, and nothing matters but that moment. I’m in that mo- ment. I want you to be in that moment. Whatever that moment is.” Haslem cautions 40 OG buyers not to overdo it. At 28 percent THC, the indica hy- brid packs a considerable wallop. “I want you to take about two or three puffs, and you got to put it down and back that ass up,” he sug- gests. “I want you to be, like, ‘This shit is fire. I’m gonna hit a couple of times because I got shit to do tomorrow.’ I want that pressure.” While he’s proud of his own strain — and the custom merch that comes with it — Has- lem says what matters more is educating his community about marijuana and clearing up common misconceptions. He emphasizes that no one should go to jail for weed in 2025. “It means the world to me, because I come from a place where it was frowned upon,” he tells New Times. “Friends of mine were get- ting locked up for it. They were getting out- cast for it. So to come into a place where I could tell my homeboys, ‘Hey, we — you — can do it legally and it’s mine. You can get my stuff, and we don’t have to hide it.’” Moreover, Haslem says, cannabis has con- nected him with people he’d otherwise never have met. “When I signed my first contract with the Heat, I had an apartment downtown in Brickell, and this building was full of medical students, doctors, and lawyers,” he recalls. “They all smoked. I would have never met these doctors, lawyers, or med students if it wasn’t for cannabis. They wouldn’t have spo- ken to me, and I probably wouldn’t have spo- ken to them. The tree has been a connector for me.” That said, if you want to smoke with the Heat legend, you’ll have to roll the joints. “I’m a flower guy — good, old-fashioned flower. But miss me with the ceremonial part. I’ve gotten too bougie,” Haslem jokes. “I don’t like to roll anymore.” [email protected] Photo by Ronald Martinez/Getty Images Photo by Visualsbyrami Blowing Smoke from p9 Above: Udonis Haslem defends against Dirk Nowitzki in game six of the 2006 NBA Finals in Dallas. The Heat won it all that night. Left: Haslem with Elad Kohen, CEO of the Flowery.
