away.

At what point did you know you had a real future in the sport?

My aspirations were on the educational side, until my high school coach started talking crazy to me. He thought that I was going to be an NBA player. He was being a coach and motivating me. At that time, I was like, "Are you crazy? The NBA is like going to the moon. When is that going to happen?"

After averaging 13.1 points and 7.2 rebounds a game in four seasons with Oklahoma, Najera became the first Mexican-born player to be selected in the NBA draft. USA TODAY Sports

Then I had a really good year as an exchange student in San Antonio and I started getting attention from coaches all over the country. Kelvin Sampson promised2009-10 season], I remember a particular play against Manu Ginobili. And he's dirty. He went up for a layup, and he knew I was going to foul him. I was preventing the basket. As I did that, he flopped -- which he typically does -- and the way he flops, he flops with his fist. When he did that, he hit me above my right eye with his fist, and I was really upset. I got the worst of it. I got kicked out of the game.

You coached the Texas Legends of the D-League for three seasons. What did you learn from that experience?

That coaching is much harder than playing. It's time consuming. The game never ends. For players, win or lose, you go home, have a nice