A former NBA player was reportedly spotted panhandling on a highway in Alexandria, Virginia, over the weekend.
Delonte West, 38, who played for the Boston Celtics, Seattle SuperSonics, Cleveland Cavaliers and Dallas Mavericks, was apparently captured in a video holding a cardboard sign and asking for money on Richmond Highway.
In the five-second viral video, a person is heard saying West’s name and seen stretching an arm out of a car window to slap the former basketball player’s hand. A caption for the clip reads, ‘Fans are saying they spotted Delonte West panhandling’.
West has struggled with substance abuse and mental health in recent years and spoken openly about his battle with bipolar disorder.
A January 2020 video showed West bleeding and in handcuffs. West reportedly got into a fight and accused a man of brandishing a gun at him.
Mavericks owner Mark Cuban stepped in around that time to help put West in a rehabilitation program in Florida. But West suffered a relapse and was arrested in October of that year.
For a while after that, West seemed to have his life back in order and got back into training, hoping to make Ice Cube’s BIG3 3-on-3 basketball league this summer. West made the draft pool for the league in April, but was ultimately not selected.
West played in the NBA through 2012, and last played professionally in 2015. In 2016, he was seen walking on a street in Maryland, raising questions around whether he was homeless. But West insisted he had a home and was doing fine.
West’s brother in 2016 said he had bipolar disorder and that he was ‘not crazy’ and ‘not on drugs’.
‘I don’t know what exactly is going on in his mind but I can tell you that he is safe and he’s doing OK,’ Dmitri West told the at the time. ‘My family are trying to get him the best professional help that’s out there, the best that they can afford.’
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