The Class of 2023 of the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame will be enshrined on Saturday. It's a star-studded class that includes the NBA all-time wins leader, coach Gregg Popovich, four-time NBA champion guard Tony Parker, Dwyane "The Flash" Wade, 2011 NBA Finals Most Valuable Player (MVP) Dirk Nowitzki and two-time NBA champion Pau Gasol.

Popovich has won five Larry O'Brien Championship Trophies in his career and got four of them with Parker, who was named the Finals MVP in 2007. The story between the two was very enlightening because the way Popovich helped Parker grow is quite unique.

"I hated him," Popovich on Friday said of Parker, reflecting on his first workout for the San Antonio Spurs. "I said I don't want him. He's a weenie. He's unaggressive. He doesn't like contact, he's 19, and I don't want to see him."

Fortunately for Parker, Popovich and the Spurs, the coach decided to give Parker a second chance after his agent's plea. Parker performed very well in his second workout, according to Popovich, and the team decided to draft him with the 28th pick in 2001. "The rest is history," Popovich said.

By history, he meant that the Spurs had a six-time All-Star guard who was also selected into the All-NBA Teams four times in 17 seasons. Parker joined Tim Duncan and Manu Ginobili to make one of the greatest trios in NBA history. Duncan was enshrined into the Hall of Fame in 2021, one year earlier than Ginobili.

"It's pretty special, Parker said of becoming a Hall of Famer. "It started two years ago. I went to Timmy's, and Timmy gave me the honor to put the jacket on him the night before. So that was pretty cool. And then Manu last year was a lot of fun to see Manu getting in the Hall. Well deserved. And to finish it off, this year for a third year in a row, coming here and doing it with Pop ... it just shows that we had a special group, and that we would just build different."

Like Parker, who is from France, Nowitzki (Germany) and Gasol (Spain) are also European players who became the top performers in their positions in the U.S. league. Parker even called Nowitzki the "greatest of all time" of European basketball.

"He told me that yesterday," Nowitzki said on Friday. "I was very humbled by that. I always give credit to everybody else. I think there were guys that paved the way for me ... If I came in and helped inspire and motivate some guys along the way that makes me incredibly proud."

"I think this class is an incredible accomplishment for international basketball," Gasol told reporters. "I think the game has grown so much since we first started playing. ... I think we can be very proud of having taken the international game to a higher level and very proud of seeing how the present and current players are taking it to the next level."

Nowitzki, Parker, Gasol and Wade were rivals for many years in the NBA, but Nowitzki and Wade shared a deeper "bond" on this front. Wade and the Miami Heat came back to beat Nowitzki and the Dallas Mavericks 4-2 in the NBA Finals in 2006 to win the title. Five years later, Nowitzki led the Mavericks to get revenge on Wade, who was teammates with LeBron James and Chris Bosh in the Heat.

"We actually bonded here the last few weeks and months," Nowitzki said. "Obviously we competed at the highest level, on the highest stage, and there was some things said on both sides and it was emotional at times. So there were pretty frosty times between us. ... But now that's all said done, and the competition is over, I think there is an appreciation and a respect there for each other's career."

"It's crazy going to Hall of Fame with Dirk," Wade said. "Obviously being competitors and the parallels of our careers, and with Tony as well. It's fitting though, and it feels right."

Other inductees of the Class of 2023 are the follows:

All-time winningest college basketball coach across all levels Gene Bess

2011 NCAA women's national championship head coach Gary Blair

Six-time All-Star, four-time All-WNBA selection Beck Hammon

Two-time Division III Coach of the Year David Hixson

Seven-time Big Ten Coach of the Year, five-time National Coach of the Year Gene Keady

1983 NCAA men's national championship head coach Jim Valvano

1976 USA Women's Olympic Basketball Team