Three years ago, Madut Bol was on break at his Amazon warehouse job — a job he didn’t like — when his old college teammate reached out: Madut’s half brother Bol Bol was playing in an elite showcase that night in New York. Did Madut want to go?



Madut had to finish his shift and technically didn’t have any more time to take off. But he didn’t care. He told his boss he was leaving early, then drove 60 miles from Trenton, N.J., to Brooklyn Bridge Park, the site of the showcase. Madut hadn’t seen Bol in four months, and even then, it was for only a minute or two when Bol had played in another showcase in New York. Their conversation after that game had been awkward, distant, like two people who hardly knew each other, which wasn’t far from the truth.



This time, Madut didn’t care if Bol knew he was there. “My dad never saw me play,” Madut says. “So, I was like, ‘I don’t want Bol to be on...