Rasheed Wallace

At first, the "R" word was spoken only every so often, and those who used it whispered - worried about being branded a nut. Now, many folks are using it and they're darn near shouting it from the rooftops. The "R" word is Rasheed . . . As in Rasheed Wallace, as in the former star at Simon Gratz High and North Carolina who now makes $13 million per season with the Portland Trail Blazers. Can it be? Just six years after we all enjoyed watching Wallace, who was routinely called the best big man produced in this city since Wilt Chamberlain, can it really be that someone who rivals Wallace's production, style and potential is now in our midst?

It appears another team can win without Donovan McNabb. With the Eagles quarterback making the last hit at a charity softball game yesterday, team McNabb beat the team headed by Portland Trailblazers forward and Philadelphia native Rasheed Wallace, 8-0. McNabb showed up in the eighth inning on a warm and sunny day that lured fans of all ages to the first Rasheed Wallace vs. Donovan McNabb Celebrity Softball Classic. The proceeds, still not tallied last night, will go to Wallace's and McNabb's charitable foundations.

Former city high school basketball star Rasheed Wallace, now a pro player, plans to open a themed restaurant called Hoops near Temple University in North Philadelphia. The restaurant would open next spring in a building, on Cecil B. Moore Avenue near 16th Street, that was originally intended as the Billie Holliday Center. Plans for the center were scaled back, and the name dropped, as the empowerment zone project ran into problems earlier this year. Wallace's participation is expected to revitalize the project, said Jamel Cato, of the North Philadelphia Financial Partnership, which lends money for projects in the empowerment zone.

Rasheed Wallace, at 21 years old, employs a sports lawyer, a business lawyer, an investment counselor, an accountant and a personal assistant who will shadow him all through his first NBA season. He says he finds his new life "kind of normal. " Wallace has just emerged from the locker room at the Washington Bullets' preseason training facility in West Virginia, after a scrimmage in which he was taken to school - repeatedly dunked over and made to look foolish - by teammate Chris Webber.

Much of the talk the last couple of days has been about how poorly the Detroit Pistons' starters not named Rasheed Wallace played in Sunday's playoff opener against the 76ers. When he wasn't sticking his head into the Sixers' huddle and teasing Maurice Cheeks, his friend and former coach, Wallace was scoring 24 points, grabbing nine rebounds, and blocking seven shots in a vintage performance. (The rest of Detroit's starters shot a collective 15 for 48 in the Sixers' 90-86 win.)

With headphones clamped on and parka hood pulled up like a monk's cowl, Rasheed Wallace walks unfazed and seemingly serene through a surreal American landscape these days. Cameras roll at him, strangers call his name, tourney bigwigs and the shoe- company guys come fawning to him, restaurant owners pose him for snapshots with their cooks, and his fellow teens float pens in his face, asking for his name in ink. This sometimes spectacular high school basketball player, star of Simon Gratz's unbeaten Bulldogs, best team in the nation, is the latest example what happens when the sports world goes promo mad over one of its young.

Approaching the brink of elimination, the Los Angeles Lakers temporarily shoved aside their egos and arrogance last night in an effort to salvage their championship aspirations. It didn't work. Now the Pistons - with Larry Brown, Rasheed Wallace, Richard Hamilton, and their Philadelphia pedigrees - have turned the NBA Finals into a lopsided series and find themselves one game from a world championship. Shoved around by Shaquille O'Neal, facing pressure for a change from the rest of his supporting cast, the Pistons stared a potential deadlock in the face and fought off the challenge.

The fast lane was always an option. Rasheed Wallace didn't live in it, but he knew it was there. It was in his face every day. Before he was a high school all-American at Simon Gratz, he was a young man trying desperately to escape the scenery of the city: drugs, death, handcuffs on the wrists of still another friend who couldn't seem to find a legal way out. For Wallace, the way out of a destitute environment was basketball. The round ball, his skills and a plethora of big-time colleges coveting his services - that would be his ticket out of Philadelphia's Germantown section.

Even though the best-of-seven playoff series is tied at two games apiece, the perception is that the Detroit Pistons have regained their edge after Sunday's 93-84 win over the 76ers. Trailing by 10 points at halftime, Detroit showed the heart and fire that made the second-seeded Pistons such prohibitive favorites at the beginning of the series. Detroit has regained at least the psychological control as the teams gear up for tonight's 7 o'clock matchup at the Palace of Auburn Hills, but the Sixers have shown resilience this season and in this series.

It wasn't a formal recruiting visit, but Simon Gratz center Rasheed Wallace happened to be an interested spectator at duPont Pavilion at Villanova's first Midnight Madness basketball practice Sunday morning. Coaches around the Big East are interested, too. If new Villanova coach Steve Lappas can land Wallace, considered the top high school senior in the nation, it would send a huge message - that the Wildcats are again capable of being among the Big East elite. Villanova already has a commitment from one of Wallace's best friends, Germantown Academy's Alvin Williams, who will be the college's first high school recruit from the city since 1973, Rollie Massimino's first year as coach.

WASHINGTON - Not surprisingly, 76ers president Rod Thorn has been impressed by his team during its quick start. The Sixers took an 8-3 record into Saturday's game at the Verizon Center against the Washington Wizards. Thorn said everybody in the main rotation has played well, giving special mention to center Spencer Hawes and guard Evan Turner. "Those two guys have improved more than anybody else," Thorn said before Saturday's game. Hawes entered the game averaging 11.0 points and 9.2 rebounds.

Celtics coach Doc Rivers told a Boston radio station that center Rasheed Wallace has said he probably will retire. On Monday, Rivers told WEEI-AM that Wallace said before Game 7 of the NBA Finals that the player believed it would be the last game of his career. The 35-year-old graduate of Simon Gratz High would finish with 15,860 points and 7,321 rebounds in a 15-year career. The volatile big man also was ejected 30 times, the most since such records started being kept in 1992.

He arrived in the Boston Celtics' locker room last night wearing a black Phillies jacket with a white logo, because he will never give up the homeboy part of him. He was, he said emphatically, in Citizens Bank Park for the Phillies and Yankees in the World Series, because he "had to be. " "Had to see my Phils," Rasheed Wallace said last night after the unbeaten Celtics (5-0) tore through the 76ers, 105-74. But he made no predictions as the Phils go into Game 6 tonight. "Take it a game at a time," 'Sheed said.

Detroit Pistons forward Rasheed Wallace has agreed to a two-year contract with the Boston Celtics, the Boston Globe reported last night on its Web site. The former Simon Gratz High star will turn 35 in September. Wallace averaged 12.0 points and 7.4 rebounds for the Pistons last season. Wallace is expected to sign with Boston on Wednesday, the first day that NBA free agents can sign contracts. Citing NBA front-office sources, ESPN.com reported that point guard Jason Kidd, 36, has agreed to re-sign with the Dallas Mavericks.

The Boston Celtics have offered forward Rasheed Wallace a contract as part of a major push to land the forward, the Boston Globe reported yesterday. The Simon Gratz High graduate was offered the deal Thursday during a three-hour meeting in Detroit. Celtics stars Kevin Garnett, Ray Allen, and Paul Pierce joined general manager Danny Ainge and managing partner Wyc Grousbeck at the meeting. Wallace's agent, Bill Strickland, told the Globe in a text message that it was a "very good meeting; some contractual terms discussed, nothing agreed to. " He also said Wallace, 35, will meet with other teams next week.

The Boston Celtics offered free-agent forward Rasheed Wallace a 2-year contract, an NBA source told the Boston Globe. Wallace, who had played for Detroit since midway through the 2003-04 season, met with Celtics ownership, coach Doc Rivers, and All-Stars Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce and Ray Allen yesterday in Detroit, the source said. A former Simon Gratz star, Wallace reportedly didn't make a decision during the meeting. Wallace averaged 12 points and 7.4 rebounds last season for the Pistons, and has also played for Washington, Portland and Atlanta during his 14-year career.

For the first time in his professional career, former 76ers wunderkind Allen Iverson faces an uncertain future as NBA free agency goes into full swing today. The high-scoring Iverson, 34 and a 13-year veteran, has no apparent home. He worked for the Denver Nuggets and the Detroit Pistons in the last year of a contract that paid him about $21 million. A back injury ended Iverson's season April 3. Detroit effectively ended its association with Iverson by sending him home as the Pistons embarked on the playoffs.

As he went around the table, embracing his mother and brothers, Tyreke Evans showed it all in his eyes: The jubilation. The relief. The fulfillment. For the 6-foot-5 guard out of Memphis, this moment was 12 years in the making. It all paid off last night at Madison Square Garden. Evans will play for the Sacramento Kings after being chosen with the fourth pick in the NBA draft. "This is crazy," said Evans, who is expected to earn a rookie salary of $3,610,080. "This is a dream I had since I was 7 years old. Watching plenty of NBA games, I was a fan of Penny Hardaway.

Charlotte Bobcats forward Gerald Wallace suffered a partially collapsed left lung and fractured a rib late in the team's double-overtime victory over the Los Angeles Lakers. Wallace scored 15 points before a flagrant foul by Andrew Bynum knocked him to the floor with 2:08 left in the fourth quarter Tuesday night in the Bobcats' 117-110 win. A statement yesterday from the Bobcats said Wallace was taken off the floor and underwent X-rays at Staples Center. Preliminary results were inconclusive, prompting Lakers team physicians to arrange a second examination.

A.I.'s playing time In a bombshell out of the Motor City, the Detroit Free Press said yesterday that guard Allen Iverson might be getting phased out of the Pistons' rotation. As his teammates were mounting a comeback that ultimately ended in a 108-105 home loss to the Houston Rockets on Sunday, Iverson watched the last 11 minutes from the bench. "I just feel like I can offer a little more to the team," said Iverson, who scored 17 points on 5-for-10 shooting. "I can help us do more to win basketball games.