Every person during his life gets inspired and influenced by certain people. People that have an impact on your views and mentality. It's no different for athletes along their careers.

Coaches, trainers, teammates, fans or just friends that have nothing to do with ball -- our kind of life gives us the opportunity to meet lots of different people from different cultures. All those friendships and meetings have turned me into the person that I am today.

I was thinking of this when watching the Los Angeles Lakers play the Chicago Bulls a couple of days ago. One of the people that has had a big impact on myself as a player and person must be Ettore Messina.  Ettore is currently working as a consultant for Mike Brown at the Lakers and previously coached me both at CSKA Moscow and Real Madrid from 2006 until 2010.

I respect him a lot and there will probably be other former players he coached along the way that think differently, but here are my reasons to do so.

Update: After Gilbert Brown went through a workout with the Phoenix Suns last week along with Michael Redd and Ime Udoka, the Suns opted to sign Redd in the end.

But Brown isn't left without a team. The undrafted rookie out of Pitt signed to play in the D-League with the Fort Wayne Mad Ants he confirmed on Sunday with Beyond the Beat.

He attended shootaround with the team -- who is an affiliate of the Detroit Pistons, Milwaukee Bucks and Indiana Pacers -- and could be available when the Mad Ants face the Canton Charge today in D-League action.

Original post after the jump...

As someone who covered Rudy Fernandez during his four years spent playing in Portland, the love, respect and honor he has toward Fernando Martin is all too familiar.

You just have to remember back to the 2009 Slam Dunk Contest when Fernandez donned Martin's Blazers jersey to understand the impact -- the first Spaniard to make it to the NBA in 1986, with the Blazers, only to die in a tragic car accident in early December 1989. 

He was just 27-years-old.

Now 22 years later, Fernandez continues his NBA story with the Denver Nuggets playing for George Karl. Both take the time to pay tribute to Martin. 

Since moving from Portland, Oregon to Nuremberg, Germany seven months ago and continuing to cover and write about basketball both back at home and overseas, I’m constantly intrigued by the amount of basketball-centric stories going on around the world.

Many of these stories go unnoticed. And for those who know me, I’ve always been a writer who enjoys telling or sharing the stories not being told.

The latest discovery: “The Iran Job”.

Mention the name Viktor Khryapa in NBA circles and the first notion that comes to mind for many people is, “that one Russian kid who played in Portland right before the rebuilding years”.

But ask about Khryapa to anyone familiar with his success playing for CSKA Moscow and the Russian National team and you’re likely to get a detailed lesson about how the 6-foot-9 forward helped CSKA win the last four Russian Championships (2008-2011), VTB United League Championship (2010) and Euroleague Championship (2008), with CSKA now gunning for another title this season thanks to Khryapa.

A lockdown defender and powering scorer, Khryapa has come into his own since leaving the NBA in 2008 and returning to CSKA.