Joey Wright allegedly abused players physically and racially

Dan Boyce

5 years ago

Former Adelaide 36ers coach Joey Wright has been called out for alleged comments said to be racist, abusive as well as physically challenging players in Tweets made by 36ers player Kevin White.

The Adelaide 36ers have recently released a media statement regarding the tweets which may have severe repercussions.

The Adelaide 36ers are investigating comments made in tweets from co-captain Kevin White. The club takes the allegations seriously and will investigate further as part on an ongoing review. No further comments will be made until the conclusion of the review.

This Wednesday it was made public that the 36ers had ‘mutually agreed’ to part ways with Wright, with the head coach then speaking to multiple media outlets about the decision.

It was believed Wright was headed to a coaching opportunity at his alma mater, Texas University while the 36ers looked to move in a different direction.

Since then a scathing tweet which seemingly indicated Wright had not been happy with the play of Jerome Randle, Eric Griffin, Ramone Moore and Harry Froling and wasn’t happy with the group after exiting the club.

WOULD YOU PLAY FOR THIS GUY???
Would you let your kids play for this guy?

For the sake of mine and my team mates mental health this needs to be exposed because it is not and should not be acceptable!
— kevin white (@kevoooo22) February 27, 2020

White, 32, noted he decided to speak out about the behaviour of Joey Wright for the “sake of mine and my teammates’ mental health”.

This seemingly provides some context on the reasons why Joey Wright was absent from both the NBL awards dinner and the 36ers end of season awards this month.

Last week Wright had called out certain players in an article in The Advertiser which challenged the level of commitment shown by key members of the playing group.

“The ones who it wasn’t good with, it wasn’t good. I’m not a halfway person, I can’t be lukewarm, you’re either with me or against me and there were four who weren’t really committed and by then the three imports and Harry didn’t give us what we needed. That was the reality of it,” Wright said.

“I would have loved for those guys to be a little bit more driven but we weren’t on the same page, and that’s not the club’s fault, that’s my fault and I tried everything I could to get them on the same page as everybody else.”

Tweets from Kevin White also alluded to the fact that is something which has been ongoing issues and not a knee jerk react to a recent incident.

Ive been told to shut my mouth & it will be handled for weeks. Well it’s now getting out of hand and I won’t stand for my team mates getting belted in the media.

You rise as a team and fall as a team!

That’s a winning cultures MOTO, every time it’s been the players. Spare me!
— kevin white (@kevoooo22) February 27, 2020

Wright, 51, had recently coached in his 500th NBL game, a loss to Perth which capped off his seven years at the helm of the club.

As soon as the 36ers season was in the books it was reported on Adelaide Now that Joey Wright and the 36ers had entered in legal talks as they looked to separate. Wright had been contracted for the next two seasons after signing a five-year deal in 2017.

36ers owner Grant Kelley declared that it was a disappointing end to the teams season and he was prepared to continue making changes within the club until he was able to bring a title to Adelaide under his leadership.

Since Kelley purchased the team in 2017 he has invested large resources into moving the team to a a much larger venue (the Adelaide Entertainment Centre), restoring the clubs history and developing a positive team culture so these claims will no doubt be taken very seriously by the 36ers front office.

Dan Boyce (817 Posts)

Dan Boyce is a die-hard Sydney Kings fan who grew up in Melbourne during the roaring 90's of Australian Basketball and spent far too much time collecting Futera NBL Basketball cards.