Watch: Shaquille O'Neal Eat Spicy Pepper For ALS Challenge
Leah Mitchell There is a new ALS challenge that features celebrities eating hot peppers. Don’t worry they are not the hot peppers that will kill a person, but they will make a person break out in a sweat.
Social media has been abuzz with the new ALS challenge titled ALS Pepper Challenge. It was started by NBA writer Tom Haberstroh, who found out his mother Patty was diagnosed with the disease at the end of last year. He wanted to do something to help find a cure, so he created his own social media challenge.
The concept is like that of the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge that took social media storm. However, instead of calling out people to dump a bucket of ice on their hands, this challenge calls out people to eat hot peppers. As Haberstroh put it, eat a hot pepper on camera, donate to the cure and call out other friends to take part. The entire Haberstroh family kicked off the challenge on Christmas as they posted a video of all of them eating hot peppers.
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It has been about a month since the challenge began but it has already spread inside the NBA. Some of basketball’s biggest names have stepped up to help raise money for the incurable disease. There is no specification in regards to what hot pepper a person must eat. It just has to be hot. It can’t be a green pepper or red pepper.
Shaquille O'Neal tried his luck with the Paqui Carolina Reaper chip, one of the hottest peppers in the world. Charles Barkley also stepped up to the challenge, but he used jalapenos. He fared much better than O’Neal but his pepper was not even close to as hot, so that helped. ESPN anchor Rachel Nichols and Miami Heat coach Erik Spoelstra has also accepted the challenge.
The ALS Pepper Challenge has raised almost $50,000 since it first began. Each day it is gaining a little more attention. It has started popping up on social media feeds where non-celebrities are stepping up to the challenge too. The ALS Ice Bucket Challenge raised $115 million, here is hoping the new one generates that much money too.
