LeBron James Nullifies Rasheed Wallace’s Guarantee

Having run his sizeable mouth in front of the nation’s media barely twenty-four hours ago, Rasheed Wallace now has egg on his face following the Detroit Pistons’ loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers. For those of you who weren’t within earshot (his big talk was said to be audible as far west as Kansas), ’Sheed offered a pretty unequivocal guarantee of success in game four. Peep the highlights of yesterday’s diatribe.“I know we’re going to win it. We’re going to bust their ass. Tomorrow night is the last game here in this building for this year. “Y’all can quote me, put it back page, front page, whatever. They can send whoever they want to send. I know the crew I think they’re going to send. But it don’t matter. I know we can do it, and they know we can do it. We know what we’ve got to do.”Oh, how the haters will laugh. Although you can probably tell that I’m enjoying this, it’s not because I harbour any particular resentment towards Rasheed and his antics. On the contrary, I admire the man for his bravado in repeatedly guaranteeing victory, trashing his opponents, and generally talking smack when others would keep their mouths shut. Still, I can’t help but find it a little amusing when someone as gully as ’Sheed directly calls a team out in the press, only to stink more than his favourite herbal remedy. His contribution of ten misses in thirteen attempts was a major factor in Detroit’s thirty-three-percent shooting, which itself was undoubtedly the main cause of their defeat. Now, having dropped two on the trot, Detroit are tied with LeBron and pals, who may well smell blood and carry their momentum into game five. Few expect Cleveland to knock the MoTown Mob out of the postseason, but if the Cavs can steal another game and force the series to seven, they’ll be making life a whole lot easier for the Heat, the Pistons’ likely opponent in the conference finals.The saying "Once bitten, twice shy" apparently doesn’t mean much to Rasheed, however. Despite coming up short on his promise to take tonight’s game, he was willing to tempt fate again in the post-game interview."I ain’t worried about these cats. There’s no way in hell they beat us in a series. They played well. I give them credit. We lost. We shot thirty percent, and they had to play their best to beat us."There’s a reason this guy’s so popular.