The Faded Smile: The Life and Death of Eddie Griffin

June 21, 2014 9:01 PM

Grantland's longform piece on former Philadelphia high school basketball superstar Eddie Griffin, whose brief career and life ended in 2007 when he crashed his SUV into a train.

Griffin stays humble on the way to the top (SLNYT).

Griffin's tragic life a story of talent and temptation.

The Eddie Griffin Story--trailer to a documentary that may never have been released?

posted by MoonOrb (3 comments total)

Eddie may have come from a broken home in a rough part of town, but he had loving family and a support system. You look at the choices he made, and the choices made by those around him, and wonder if any of them could of done it differently to help him. They didn't let him get away with having anger issues in high school just because he was a star jock. Every team he played for wanted to help him out and get him in a position to succeed in life and basketball. But he just tuned them out and did his own self-destructive thing.

His first car crash was such a joke when it happened. Also-ran NBAer in car accident because he was watching porn in the car. If I'd know his whole story I wouldn't have been laughing back then. I'm certainly not doing so now.
posted by thecjm at 9:30 PM on June 21, 2014 [2 favorites]

He tried to murder a woman and only got a misdemeanor assault charge and 18 months probation for it.

The grantland article covers his shooting a gun at a girlfriend who had caught him cheating on her and was fleeing from him thusly:

Griffin returned to Houston, where his legal troubles continued. On April 7, 2007, Griffin was charged with misdemeanor assault following a fight with another man inside the house Griffin shared with Jessica Jimenez.

[Edit: That is incorrect - different event- the shooting was in 2003 ]

That is quite the soft-pedal.

It is only luck (and poor shooting) that he didn't take others with him.
posted by srboisvert at 6:25 AM on June 22, 2014 [1 favorite]

I work just on the other side of the 45 from where he died and I'd never heard of him at all. So strange that he could make such a splash and then be lost completely once he died.
posted by librarylis at 10:21 AM on June 22, 2014