Dion Waiters to wear No. 3 in honor of his inspirations

At media day yesterday, Dion Waiters announced that he would be changing his number to three for the upcoming season. Last season, Waiters wore number 23 for the Thunder. Waiters would have worn number three last year, but it was already taken by Perry Jones. With Jones now in Boston, the number three is now free for Waiters' taking.

Dion Waiters wears number 3 because he idolized Allen Iverson while growing up in Philadelphia. In an interview from last year, Dion described why AI was his favorite player. Dion also gets into another more personal reason for his number preference.

"It's so crazy man. You've gotta just look at it, man. AI. Puts Philly on the map. He changed the game of basketball. That's one of the reasons I wear number three. Because of him and my best friend. My best friend got killed. He played ball. He wore number three.

I was going to name my son Dion Waiters III, but I want him to be his own man. So I gave him Dion Rhalik Waiters. That's my best friend's middle name, Rhalik. My son was born on June 7th. That's AI's birthday! You see what I'm saying? That's crazy, right? It's crazy how things work man."