Assistant coach denies allegations from ex-wife
Griffin accused of abuse, parental neglect on Twitter on Thursday
Adrian Griffin will remain on the job as a Raptors assistant coach after allegations of abuse and parental neglect were levelled at him by his ex-wife Thursday morning.
Team officials, who spent Thursday investigating the social media allegations, said Griffin would be in his usual spot on the team bench Friday afternoon.
“When we saw these allegations this morning, we were dismayed,” the Raptor said in a statement. “Adrian is a valuable member of our team. Our leadership immediately spoke with him, and he flatly denied the allegations in the posts. We will support the process as he and his former partner settle these matters.”
Specific allegations of abuse arose on social media on Thursday morning, hours after Griffin had made his head coaching debut in a guest appearance with the Raptors.
His ex-wife — Griffin is remarried — made the allegations on her Twitter feed. Griffin and his ex-wife have three children in their late teens and early 20s.
“This morning, accusations were made against me on social media by my former wife that I vehemently deny,” Griffin said in a statement provided by the team. “We are involved in a long-standing legal dispute over alimony and child support arrangements.
“I am disappointed to have to address false accusations in this way, and I apologize for any distraction this has potentially caused for our team at this important time.”
Griffin joined the Raptors at the start of the 2018-19 season as an assistant coach. He became far more prominent this week when head coach Nick Nurse handed over the coaching duties to him for Wednesday’s win over the Philadelphia 76ers.
“From the first tip of the game, he did an unbelievable job,” Raptors guard Kyle Lowry said of Griffin. Hopefully Coach Griffin will get a chance to be a head coach soon. We’ll miss him, but hopefully he gets his opportunity to be a head coach.”
The 46-year-old Griffin has been a long-time player and coach in the NBA. He played for five teams in a nine-year playing career and coached in Milwaukee, Chicago, Orlando and Oklahoma City before joining Nurse’s staff last year.
The native of Wichita, Kan., has long been considered a possible NBA head coach and spoke Wednesday about the chance the Raptors and Nurse gave him.
“(The players) think I’m an old head, but I remember being out there on the floor so I have always tried to show them the type of respect I wanted as a player and that’s really helped me as a coach,” he said Wednesday night.