But only one of them is still playing.
The story of how Marco Belinelli learned to make 3-pointers that are not found anywhere on the degree-of-difficulty scale is actually a story about a kid growing up in Italy who dreamed of one day making it to the NBA, and one day being like Kobe Bryant -- a guy with his own Philly and Italy connections.
"There's a couple of great shooters from Italy, too, but I always dreamed of becoming a player like Kobe Bryant or Michael Jordan when I was young," said Belinelli, whose 4-for-7 shooting from 3-point range was astonishing mostly because he never once made a shot in the traditional manner -- squaring up, following through and jumping toward the basket.