In this special case, Moses Moody is happy – and even proud – to be watching and cheering from the sidelines.
Moody knows the power he holds is bigger than what the scoreboard says. He also doesn’t hesitate in letting it be known that the team he is coaching is the No. 1 seed and made the championship game.
The next day, they fell short of a title, but the final score is the last thing that will be remembered.
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Moody from Saturday, Aug. 3 through Tuesday, Aug. 6 spent four days as a Basketball Without Borders Africa camp coach at the American International School of Johannesburg in South Africa where the Warriors shooting guard was able to bring his mother, father, grandmother and brother along for a once-in-a-lifetime flight he couldn’t pass up. The opportunity wasn’t even on the table until about a week ahead of the camp.
The call to go to Africa
Training in LA, his agent, Rich Paul of Klutch Sports, called Moody and asked if he was up for the trip. The impact he would make on numerous kids didn’t immediately hit the fourth-year NBA guard. Admittedly, he wasn’t going to turn down going to Africa. Young children chanting and dancing around him as Moody’s smile matched their own in an event away from the basketball court told a different story.
That was all fun for Moody, who couldn’t contain his happiness, but the basketball and life teachings he instilled in his players and all campers ages 16 and 17 years old is where he believes his influence was felt most.
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“I’m telling them, ‘I’m glad y’all are here. I want you to see this as an opportunity,’ ” Moody told NBC Sports Bay Area on Monday of the four-day camp. “But me personally, I don’t care as much about winning and losing in these games. More so it’s about you guys capitalizing on this opportunity.
“And the basketball capacity, showing your talent and doing it that way, but also through connections, through the people here, learning that way. That’s really been my message to my guys.”
Campers were divided into three teams, coached by Moody, Immanuel Quickley of the Toronto Raptors and Bruno Fernando, who played 45 games for the Atlanta Hawks last season and signed a one-year contract with Raptors this offseason. Former Warriors first-round draft pick Ekpe Udoh was as an assistant coach, and Golden State Valkyries general manager Ohemaa Nyanin served as a camp director.
Developing a basketball hot-bed
Basketball Without Borders since 2001 has grown into a talent hot-bed as a skills development program for the NBA and FIBA alike, finding numerous stars, including Joel Embiid as a BWB Africa participant in 2011. Embiid two years ago became the first Basketball Without Borders alum to be named NBA MVP.
This year’s Africa event included 60 campers – 30 boys and 30 girls – from 24 African countries, and five players from the boys' side are NBA Africa Academy prospects. Days began with drills and workouts before getting right into games, and after the camp concluded, awards such as MVP, Defensive MVP, Sportsmanship Award, Most Improved Player and 3-Point Champion were given to the boys and girls who earned the honors.
Equally as important for kids and staff like Moody were lessons and memories made outside of basketball he was brimming about. Though we spoke on a Monday, Moody couldn’t even remember what day it was. A cross-continental flight and nine-hour time difference from his Bay Area basketball home will do that. For everything Moody already had seen, he needed more, extending his trip an extra day.
Moody immersed himself in the outdoors of Africa, visiting a tiger park and had just returned from the safari prior to our conversation, where a lion ripping meat off a stick was so close to him he could peer into every speck of the beast’s yellow eyes. He and his family also stepped foot in the house of a hero.
“We went to Nelson Mandela’s house and had dinner (made) by his people,” Moody remembered. “His chefs and everything were there and they cooked it up at his house. That was a really cool thing. I’ve had a lot of really good experiences since I’ve been here.”
As he coached his team and was part of all the camp’s activities on and off the court, Moody’s family also was able to do stuff he wasn’t able to because of time constraints. That’s what prompted the extra day, squeezing in as many experiences as possible before heading home.
“They went to this one place, it’s a village – it’s not a real village but it’s a replica of a village,” Moody explained. “The people there are telling stories and teaching you about the culture and things like that.
“And there’s another spot they went to that’s shops and just a whole bunch of people trying to sell you stuff. It’s just really dealing with people, with real people here.”
Paying it forward
Basketball Without Borders Africa was the latest example of Moody, often praised for being mature far beyond his age, inspiring the youth and those older than him as well. The 22-year-old has been a beacon of light for his hometown Little Rock, Ark. this summer. First in late June he and Paul hosted “A Night With Moses Moody” where the two shared personal stories that led to their successful journeys, and then in July he held his annual Little Rock Basketball Camp for ages 11 through 15.
Moody credits a fellow Little Rock native who spent 18 years in the NBA as being his first model of what can be done for his area with a bigger platform. Joe Johnson when Moody was a kid held a 3-on-3 tournament in a parking lot, an event that nobody could know would forever change the life of a future top draft pick.
“Obviously being young, I didn’t know what goes into giving back or putting on an event like that,” Moody said. “All I know is that was accessible to me at a young age. Being there with Joe Johnson was the top of the world at that point. Me being a kid from Little Rock like, ‘Oh, he’s in the NBA.’
“Being around him for one, but then just creating an event for me to go to and compete in and have fun for the day, just being able to put myself in that perspective and being able to appreciate things as a kid. How I felt as a kid, I can see that as an adult and that was fun. … Given that I view Joe Johnson in that light and I would listen to anything he says and everything he does is golden, well that’s an opportunity for not just fun. So that’s some things that I’ve been putting on back in Little Rock.”
What Moody is most proud of is a new addition to events from his Motivate One summer series, held one week after his youth basketball camp.
A random conversation between Moody and his father trying to find ways to extend their impact past what a typical NBA player does became a day that children of all ages, races and genders can greatly benefit from, whether they ever pick up a basketball or not.
“My favorite one was a youth summit,” Moody says. “We exposed the kids to different trades. We partnered with a group called Trades 4Life, who teaches trades. We had a car out there and they’re learning how to change a tire. We had an electrician out there and they’re learning the basics of that field. A barber showing them how to cut hair. How to do some small things – laying brick, laying concrete, they were doing all that.”
There also was an interactive conversation for the kids held by people who aren’t professional athletes but work in sports.
“So many kids play sports, but then when that doesn’t work out or whenever that stops happening then they have to go figure out something completely different,” Moody said. “But that’s just because they’re not exposed to so many jobs that you can get into that are around sports.
“Rather if it’s a journalist, rather if it’s a photographer, rather if it’s a chef – there’s so many things you can do around sports, so that’s what that was guided on, exposing them to that and letting them ask questions and figure things out.”
Understanding his impact
A mere two weeks after the summit, Moody and his family were on a plane headed to Africa. The magnitude of the moment for what was being displayed as the growth of basketball in Africa wasn’t fully understood until Moody stepped foot on land.
While Steph Curry, LeBron James, Kevin Durant and the NBA’s superstars were on their way to an iconic gold medal for Team USA at the 2024 Paris Summer Olympics, their closest game between exhibitions and the Olympics was a one-point win over South Sudan, the world’s youngest country after gaining independence and choosing secession from Sudan in 2011.
Nigeria’s women’s basketball team made history in Paris, becoming the first Olympic team from Africa – male or female – to reach the quarterfinals of the Olympics after beating Australia and Canada.
“I didn’t really understand the significance of it until I got here,” Moody says. “I’ve talked to the guys, because one of the things that I’ve talked to them about and they completely understand is using basketball as a tool, and not letting basketball use you. I don’t want you to be dependent on basketball to where you need it for whatever. Basketball is a tool that can get you to a lot of places. So seeing South Sudan doing what they’re doing, seeing Nigeria doing what they’re doing, it’s making basketball cool and exposing that tool to many different people.
“Basketball is why I’m able to do what I’m doing right now. If people didn’t play basketball in Arkansas then I would never be in the position that I am now talking to you, and my family’s in a different position than we were growing up because I played basketball. That’s all because I was exposed to it. It can do the exact same thing to so many different people in Africa in so many different circumstances, from the top to the bottom.
“It’s just an opportunity away. There’s plenty of ways that it can happen, but that’s just a good one that I’m glad it’s being exposed.”
From the Bay Area to Little Rock and countless countries of Africa, Moody’s toolbox held by wisdom, insight and a greater understanding continues to expand as his social impact has now been felt all over the world entering his fourth season with the Warriors.
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