Hoop dreams, amid barbed wire
The Warriors’ pregame routine of passing out basketball jerseys, divvying up bananas and Gatorade and talking strategy is halted by an uncompromising warning.
We have a no-hostage policy in this arena. If one of them grabs you, we shoot through you to the prisoner.
Reminders such as these from the armed prison guards are jolting and frequent.
When you’re playing a game at San Quentin State Prison, your life can be forever altered in an instant. Nevertheless, members of the Warriors organization over the past few years have traveled to the state’s oldest prison to play against inmates in a game that affects both sides beyond the thrill of competition.
“The first time I went, it was mostly out of curiosity,” general manager Bob Myers said. “It was a chance to go into a maximum-security prison and play basketball. I just wanted to see it. You always try to find different experiences, and I was very intrigued by it.
“You want to keep going back because
it’s such a rewarding experience.”
The first time Myers went, he didn’t tell his wife all of the details. He didn’t want her, sitting at home with their two young daughters, to worry about his safety. Now, he’s so comfortable with the experience that he shares stories about the inmates with her.
Stay bunched together, at all times.
About 10 years ago, carefully selected inmates at San Quentin were allowed to form a basketball team and host games as one of the prison’s outreach programs. The prison has other sports programs and has held music concerts and comedy specials.
The Warriors got involved with the basketball program about seven years ago, when a member of the team’s business operations staff, Ben Draa, started playing there on the first and third Saturdays of eight months a year. He invited assistant general manager Kirk Lacob to play last season, and word moved through the rest of the basketball operations department.
The Warriors donated old practice jerseys to the inmates. Coach Mark Jackson and rookie forward Draymond Green have joined the experience.
When Green went, he was nursing a knee injury, so he didn’t play. Instead, he mixed and mingled among the crowd.
Green considers himself such a dominoes expert that he has an app on his phone, but on the yard, he was the fish at the table. He got skunked, which usually means a punishing run around the facility.
“They didn’t make me run, but I would have done it,” Green said. “I’m glad, because it gave me more time to sit and talk with them.”
You always want to make sure that this is an away game.
As long as outsiders have been allowed into San Quentin, the reaction often has been similar. The pristine landscaping and picturesque setting are juxtaposed against reminders of the infamy that is housed there.
Early on a September day, the Warriors meet at the team’s practice facility in Oakland and travel up Interstate 580 in a bus. The jovial chatter dissipates as they get closer to the prison.
Once visitors are preapproved for entry, they arrive at the castle-like structure that sits atop a 275-acre plot on the northeast portion of the San Francisco Bay and looks as though it’s from another era. Cell phones, driver’s licenses and wallets are collected before visitors enter a “cow gate” from the stagecoach days.
Before members of the Warriors organization walk through to the main entrance, guards gather their IDs and they get stamped, signed in and warned about bringing in anything that could be considered contraband.
They stand in a holding cell with bars on one side and hear a loud, echoing locking noise. When the door opens on the other side, the expansive yard is exposed.
It’s a stunning setting. Mount Tamalpais towers in the distance and the sun glints off the bay as part of a perfect backdrop. There’s a church, a hospital and a fountain. There are tennis courts and baseball fields. There’s a basketball court and a track.
Nearby is the “Adjustment Center,” the only male Death Row in the state and the largest in the country. It once housed Charles Manson and was the execution site ofWilliam Bonin (the notorious “Freeway Killer”) and Crips gang leader Stanley “Tookie” Williams. “Scorecard Killer” Randy Kraft and convicted wife-killer Scott Peterson currently sit on Death Row.
The yard teems with hundreds of the 5,000 inmates locked up there. They’re all looking at their guests.
The experience leaves an impression.
Lacob: “You look right past the grass, the trees and the church. All you see is the fully barred windows of the Adjustment Center, and that’s when it gets real.”
Myers: “You realize that you’re not walking through a rose garden. You’re immediately aware of where you are when you see the guards in the towers.”
Jackson: “The gate closing behind me is something I can still hear as clear as day. It was a reminder of what territory I was embarking on.”
Don’t run unless you’re on the court. Otherwise the guards might think you’re an inmate who is making a break for it.
By the time the visitors make their way to the basketball courts, a crowd of hundreds has gathered, some on metal bleachers and others sitting on picnic tables. The onlookers chirp and jeer, but this is serious business to the players.
The San Quentin team holds practices, has a coach, runs plays and breaks down each game for the weeks that follow. Knowing that this is a privilege, they treat it as such — offering the visitors shoulder hugs and playing physically but congenially.
They play four 12minute quarters with an official hand-turned scoreboard and keep statistics. One of the prisoners does an entertaining version of playby-play from the sideline without the need of a microphone.
Three inmates are trained in NBA rules and strictly officiate the game. They can’t use whistles, because that’s a distress signal. When they hear a whistle, everyone in the yard hits the deck and the guards immediately mobilize. So the referees use duck
calls.
The loser gets a free one-night stay.
On this day, the Warriors pulled out a 114-98 victory behind Myers’ 39 points and Jackson’s 12 points and crowd-pleasing passing. But that wasn’t what mattered. Members of both sides stayed after the game and exchanged smiles and stories.
There are more rules. If they don’t offer, don’t ask a prisoner what landed him there, and use only first names. Many inmates will tell you immediately that they are nonviolent third-strike offenders. Some choose not to offer any explanation.
The name thing was no problem for Myers, who wasn’t called by his first or last name. The inmates simply called him GM.
“When you think about prisoners, you don’t conjure up images of the guys we played against,” Myers said. “You’re not sure what is appropriate to ask, and they beat you to the punch, anyway. They want to know about the Warriors. They don’t want to talk about their daily lives.
“They want to talk about Mark Jackson. They hold him on such a high pedestal, and him showing up means that he values them, too.”
After a game in September, the inmates got together and mailed a thank-you letter and a signed photo to Jackson.
“I went in thinking it was a chance to impact lives, and I came out knowing that it had impacted mine. I’d love to do it again and again and again,” Jackson said. “I went in with my heart and prayers going out to the victims of the mistakes (they) made. That remained, but I came out with my heart and prayers going out to those guys in there, too.
“I’m sure society and the powers-that-be can treat them like animals, but they’re human beings who made mistakes. It’s important to let them know that we’ve still got love for them, we’re still pulling for them, and they can still win in spite of huge losses.”