Ben Wallace Biography
Ben
Wallace has not had the road to basketball stardom
that many of his successful contemporaries have
had. He very nearly pursued football rather than
basketball and unlike many of the other big names
in the sport today - for example: Kobe Bryant
and LeBron James he was not first pick for any
team but rather ended up as an undrafted player
and was subsequently signed as a rookie free agent
by the Washington Bullets in 1996. That said,
he has grown into one of the most successful defensive
players of all time with his large stature (he's
6"9 and weighs over 200lbs) giving him the
nickname "Big Ben".
Walllace
was born September 10, 1974, in White Hall, Alabama
as the 10th of 11 children, and the youngest of
eight brothers. With so many siblings basketball
became a way of life quite early for Wallace,
the brother's always playing three on three or
four on four in their spare time.
As he matured he grew into quite
an athlete, receiving state honors across three
competitive team sports at High School: basketball,
football and baseball but wasn't pursuing anything
seriously despite his proclamations to his friends
that he could shoot like Isiah, pass like Magic
and dunk like Michael.
Things began to change when he
managed to get enough money together to attend
a basketball camp in York, Alabama, run by Charles
Oakley of the New York Knicks. Rumor has it that
Oakley sought to illustrate the reality of the
game to Wallace by playing a little one on one
with him. Convinced that Wallace was not taking
the game seriously he started to hammer him on
offense and defense but was soon surprised that
Ben was able to body him back every time.
This impression he had made on
Oakley was to be significant soon after when Wallace
was struggling to find a college that would let
him play basketball and not football. Oakley heard
of his problems and managed to get him a place
on the Cuyahoga Community College basketball team
and then later in 1994 as a VUU Panther...as we
said Wallace didn't take the "normal"
route into the NBA!
He was successful at The Panthers,
leading them to the Division-II Final Four and
earning All-America honors. He now had his eyes
set firmly on the NBA draft but the day came and
went and no interest was shown. With no road in
he accepted a job playing in Italy but a month
later got a call from Wes Unseld, GM of the Washington
Bullets who was intrigued by Ben's raw skills.
He was soon signed as the Washington Bullets 12th
man.
On August 3, 2000, he was traded
along with Chucky Atkins to the Detroit Pistons
for Grant Hill and since then he has proved himself
time and time again winning the NBA Defensive
Player of the Year Award four times - a feat matched
only by Dikembe Mutombo. He also constantly ranks
among the best rebounders and shot blockers with
impeccable defensive timing giving him a low foul
rate of less than 2.1 per game.
Despite his ineffectiveness in
offense he has become and remains one of the most
successful defensive players the sport has ever
seen.
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