Profile of Rasheed Wallace on Famous Like Me

Rasheed Abdul Wallace (born September 17, 1974 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) is a professional basketball player in the National Basketball Association. He currently plays power forward for the Detroit Pistons.

Originally selected out of the University of North Carolina by the Washington Bullets (now the Wizards) in the 1995 NBA Draft, Wallace was named to the All-Rookie second team following his first season. Following the same season he and Harvey Grant were traded to the Portland Trail Blazers in exchange for Rod Strickland and Kevin Duckworth. He had a career high 42 points against the Denver Nuggets in 2001 and was a key member of the Blazers team that made it to the Western Conference Finals that same year. Wallace had a career best 19.4 points per game in 2002 for the Blazers.

In 2004 Rasheed Wallace helped power the Detroit Pistons to the NBA title and obtained his first championship ring, or "ship" as Rasheed would say. In Detroit, Wallace has become known for selfless team play and integrated with Ben Wallace to form the core of the Pistons' smothering defensive game. At 6'11" and 230 pounds (104 kg), Wallace plays power forward or center defending on the opposition and is capable of making almost any play offensively, from a slam dunk to a long 3-point jump shot. He is an adequate free throw shooter, an excellent passing big man, and a good rebounder at both ends of the court.

Controversy

Wallace is a controversial player. He regularly led the NBA in technical fouls and earned himself a bad reputation among fans by numerous missteps during his Portland period, and even was booed sometimes during home games. He seldom talked to the media, and he became notorious for saying to reporters, "It was a good game. Both teams played hard."

On the other hand, many praise his unselfish play and his obvious talent. In addition, he is a well-known benefactor, often attending charity events. Wallace participates in various community activities. The Rasheed A. Wallace Foundation was established in 1997 to assist in the recreational and educational development of youth in Philadelphia, PA, Portland, OR, Durham, NC, and other selected communities. Each program promotes social, cultural & academic development for youth.

Wallace's teammates have nearly universally praised his presence in the locker room, and his image has been rehabilitated somewhat since coming to Detroit. His technical fouls have continued, but he has become much less likely than before to receive 2 technicals in a single game, which results in a player's ejection from that game. He has become a generally worthwhile interview subject. He has selflessly taken a back seat to Pistons leaders Ben Wallace and Chauncey Billups; indeed, despite his undeniable star quality, he has often seemed more comfortable in a supporting role. This may go hand-in-hand with another quality his critics have emphasized, Wallace's inconsistency. He typically intersperses dominant performances with indifferent ones. For a player with such elite athletic gifts, he may not be comfortable with the pressure of being a team's primary star, expected to prove his status with regularly exceptional offensive play. Some journalists have speculated this explains the contrast in his Portland and Detroit behavior.

Background

Early Years

Rasheed began his basketball career in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He attended Simon Gratz High School. Rasheed was named USA Today High School Player of the Year after the 1992-93 season and was selected first team All America by Basketball Times. Despite limited playing time of just 19 minutes per game, Rasheed still managed to average 16 points, 15 rebounds and 7 blocks during his senior year. In addition to basketball, Rasheed also ran track and high jumped.

College

University of North Carolina then-coach Dean Smith lured Rasheed to Chapel Hill, North Carolina for his college years. Smith was a revered mentor to Wallace as he was to Wallace's eventual Detroit coach Larry Brown; Rasheed has indicated that this North Carolina bond with Brown helped Wallace adjust quickly to the Piston system. During his time at Carolina, Rasheed had tremendous success in the national spotlight. Named a second-team All-American by the AP his second year, Rasheed ranks as the leading career field goal shooter in Atlantic Coast Conference history with a .635 percentage.

Rasheed helped lead the Tar Heels to the NCAA Final Four in 1995. Rasheed left North Carolina to enter the 1995 NBA Draft after his sophomore season. Wallace was selected in the 1st round, the 4th pick draft pick overall by the Washington Bullets.

NBA career

As a rookie in Washington, Rasheed played in 65 games, 51 of which he started. While mostly playing power forward, he also gained experience in the center position although being physically overmatched. Wallace was selected to the rookie team for the All Star Weekend. Later that year, he fractured his left thumb during a game against Orlando and could not return until the following year.

After the season, Rasheed was traded to the Portland Trail Blazers, a move that proved beneficial for both sides. He led the Blazers in scoring 12 times, and also ranked third in the league in field goal percentage. Unfortunately, just as his season was gaining momentum, Rasheed again broke his left thumb--ironically in a game against the Bullets--and was forced to miss the next month of the season, but he returned in time for a strong performance in the first round playoff series against the Los Angeles Lakers. Despite the Blazers losing the series, Wallace's play was a bright spot that gave Blazer fans something to look forward to in 97-98.

Rasheed's next season was one of many highs. The young superstar signed a long term contract to stay with the Portland Trail Blazers. Rasheed was showcased as the team's all-around player on a club with many specialists. Rasheed began extending himself into the community more than ever, most notably with his Rasheed Wallace Foundation, but his career suffered from numerous missteps on and off the court.

Rasheed led the Trail Blazers to the Western Conference Finals in 1999 and 2000, losing to the San Antonio Spurs and the Los Angeles Lakers, respectively. Both teams would go on to win the NBA Finals. The 2000 series against the Lakers was most noted for the Blazers blowing a 24 point lead going into the fourth quarter. Wallace would never again experience that level of success with Portland.

After some mediocre years, Rasheed was traded to the Detroit Pistons, established himself as a regular starter and helped them win an unexpected NBA title in 2004, beating the heavily favoured Lakers 4 games to 1. He currently sports the #36 (rather than his usual #30) in the memory of his late brother, and is seen as one of the premier players at the power forward position. He became especially popular with Detroit fans for his boisterous on-court emotions and periods of hot 3-point shooting. Nearly every time he gets the ball, the fans scream "Sheed!". After the championship season, he paid for custom "championship belts" to be made for each of his teammates and presented them as gifts when the next season's training started.

Throughout the 2004-05 season, Wallace often carried the belt into his locker before games to inspire the Pistons' title defense. In the 2005 playoffs, for the second consecutive year, the following happened: the Pistons fell behind in a best-of-7-games series with the Indiana Pacers; after the loss, Rasheed guaranteed to the media that the Pistons would win the next game; and the Pistons proved Rasheed right, then went on to win the series. The difference was that in 2004 Rasheed had had a poor shooting night and the Pistons had won anyway; in 2005 Rasheed played a brilliant all-around game to ensure the guarantee would be fulfilled. He finished with 17 points scored, 12 rebounds, 5 blocked shots and 2 steals.

After the second-round elimination of the Pacers, Rasheed played his best series of the postseason in the Eastern Conference finals against the top-seeded Miami Heat. He shot a 50 percent field goal percentage and averaged 14.5 points a game in the series' seven games, and saved his hottest-shooting night for the decisive Game 7. Against the San Antonio Spurs in the NBA Finals, Rasheed seemed to be poised to become the series goat when, in overtime of the remarkably closely fought Game 5, Wallace abandoned playing defense on Robert Horry with nine seconds to play and the Pistons leading 85-83 on their home court. This was inexplicable because Horry, a widely feared 3-point specialist, was having one of the hottest long-range shooting nights of his frequently heroic career. Horry made the game-winning 3-point shot with six seconds to go, the Spurs took a 3-games-to-2 lead, and many pundits assumed the Finals were all but over, and that Rasheed's blown defensive assignment would take on additional infamy. The Pistons would have to win 2 straight games in San Antonio to repeat as champions, and only one team facing such a situation in NBA Finals history had even won one game (the 1953-54 Syracuse Nationals).

For the Pistons to do so on the road after such a shocking loss seemed daunting at best. But well into the fourth quarter, Game 6 was as tense as Game 5, except that the Pistons were more consistently maintaining a narrow lead. Rasheed had committed his fifth personal foul as the 4th quarter began and left the game so that he would have hope of playing the last few minutes; one more foul would have ended his night. Then, after re-entering the game with five minutes to play, Rasheed scored 7 of the Pistons' last 13 points to finish with 16. The Pistons had a one-point lead before Rasheed started shooting but wound up winning 95-86. Rasheed's final basket was a rebound, too, as he tipped in Billups' missed driving layup. Then, with the Pistons ahead 91-86 and 1:30 left to play, Rasheed made two brilliant defensive plays that sealed the win. He stripped the ball from the quicker Manu Ginobili as the Argentine star dribbled under the basket, then rebounded a missed Ginobili jump shot. Rasheed had earned some measure of redemption, helped his teammates hold San Antonio scoreless over the last two-and-a-half minutes, and forced a winner-take-all Game 7 two nights later, which the Pistons would lose 81-74

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