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Im sure he regrets it everyday except payday.
I know you guys know this but its an intersting read.
Ben Wallace is many things – proud, tough, unyielding. But he’s not stupid. It might have been coincidence that he decided to challenge Scott Skiles’ authority in Madison Square Garden – the mecca of basketball, in the heart of the world’s media center – but there’s no getting around the fact that it was an act of defiance.
A few hours after Big Ben put his name to the four-year, $60 million contract that delivered him from Detroit to Chicago this summer, he went to dinner with Skiles and Bulls GM John Paxson. Skiles leaned over to Wallace and told him then that he should leave his headbands back in Detroit.
As Wallace told that story to a member of the Pistons organization, he listened and responded like this: “Ben, for $60 million, you can probably learn to live without the headbands.” To which Wallace replied, “I know. I just wonder what else they haven’t told me.”
That’s a lousy way to start a very serious relationship. What else they didn’t tell him was that he couldn’t blare his music in the locker room and that he would have to tape his ankles for every game and practice, which he didn’t do with the Pistons because he said it caused pain and limited movement.
Chauncey Billups talks to his former teammate and Pistons co-captain on almost a daily basis. He’s seen this coming for a long time.
“It’s tough,” Billups said after Monday’s Pistons practice. “I feel for him. I talk to him all the time and I know he’s frustrated. I know he’s highly frustrated. I know how Ben is. When he’s frustrated, things like (the headband incident) are going to happen. But for the most part, he don’t bother nobody. He do what he do, just mosey along, don’t say nothing. But when he finally does say something, then you know he’s got to the boiling point.”
I asked if he believed what Wallace did was done to bring the situation to a head and force a confrontation.
“I don’t know, man,” Billups said behind a sheepish smile. “You’ve got to ask him. I know, but I ain’t saying. You’ve got to ask him.”
Ben Wallace built himself into a commodity valuable enough that at least one NBA team thought he was worth $15 million a year. That he managed to do so despite being a legitimate 6-foot-7 with no discernible ball skills speaks to the incredible fire that burns within him. He is completely and wholly a self-made basketball player.
Which is where the trouble starts. It’s compounded by the fact that he’s incredibly sensitive. With Big Ben, things that don’t even rise to the level of constructive criticism are taken as great affront. Everything is viewed as a threat to the manhood of an incredibly proud man who believes all the hard work he put in to make himself the four-time Defensive Player of the Year, an All-Star and an NBA champion ought to translate into unchallenged acceptance of his beliefs on basketball and beyond.
But he didn’t accomplish any of those things on the Bulls’ dime, so he’s got no equity in Chicago. And they’re killing him in the papers and on talk radio. Saturday’s win at New York snapped a six-game losing streak for the 4-9 Bulls, whose team defense has been significantly weaker than a year ago.
The night before the Wallace insurrection, the Bulls were hammered at Philadelphia. Skiles yanked Wallace less than three minutes into a game in which he would play not quite 20 minutes and finish with a triple-zero – points, rebounds and blocked shots. When Skiles noticed the headband two minutes into Saturday’s game, he yanked him again. A series of assistant coaches walked to the end of the bench to get Wallace to relent on wearing his headband, which he finally did. But when he put it on again before the Bulls took the court for the third quarter, Skiles immediately sent Malik Allen into the game for Wallace. Skiles then closed the locker room doors for 25 minutes after the game, 10 longer than allowed under NBA rules.
“The Bulls at least need to fine Wallace, if not suspend him, for an egregious act that is way beyond a simple stunt of dissent or petulance,” Chicago Tribune NBA columnist Sam Smith wrote. “Some who know Wallace say he has gotten caught up in his image, the hairstyle and the Big Ben thing, and Skiles is taking that away from him with the sweatband issue and other team rules. So if Ben can’t be Ben, he’s not going to play like Ben. That will show them! We love to make excuses for the 19-year-olds, but he’s 32.”
And Skiles is 42, but every bit as stubborn – and every bit as much a self-made basketball player – as Ben Wallace. A few weeks after the Bulls hired him, Skiles made a defiant pronouncement of his own when he found a recalcitrant player on his roster, Eddie Robinson. “I’ve never lost a battle of wills in my life,” he said, “and I don’t plan on doing it now.”
Is there much chance of a compromised resolution between two men whose success has always been grounded in uncompromising adherence to their own beliefs? Wallace is signed through 2010, Skiles through 2009. If the Bulls decide they have to swallow one contract, guess who wins?
Wrote Smith, “Pistons players say Wallace has burned up the cell-phone satellites in recent weeks complaining about the Bulls, Skiles and signing in Chicago. My guess is the Bulls would gladly take the money and send him back.”
The Bulls all but admitted they overspent on Wallace back in July, but chose to emphasize the fact that adding a dominant player to a team that gave Miami a scare in last spring’s playoffs called for a bold move. Around the league, the sentiment seemed to be similar. It was acknowledged that there would come a point over his four-year contract when the Bulls would want to shed themselves of the burden. No one ever guessed it would happen this soon.
got that from Pistons.com
Im sure he regrets it everyday except payday.
^See, I don't get that. At one point the article talks about Ben being a self-made man/basketball player, but then at the same time he's ultra sensitive. So, this article is telling me that Ben didn't have to put up with constant doubts about his ability and criticism as he was trying to come up through the league? You know he did have to do that, so why is he so suddenly this 'sensitive' basketball player who can't handle not wearing his head band? Doesn't make sense to me. Look, Ben signed a 60 freakin' million dollar contract, nobody held a gun to his head and told him to do it. He got greedy and wanted the money, ok, fine. Now, be a man and a professional and play your ass off for your current team, period. You can't wear your head band? You can't listen to your loud ass music in the locker room? Boo ing Hoo, grow up and play the game that made you an all-star my man, that's it.
It's too late for regrets, now. All Ben can do is just tae it on the chin and play on.
Ben Wallace has always been sensitive. It doesn't mean he's not a self-made man. But, certain things really tend to embarrass him. His free throw shooting being one of them. When teams intentionally fouled him in close games, you could tell his frustration and embarassment. He's sensitive about it. He hasn't been sensitive about his rebounding or defense because he's always proved people wrong about that. Now, that he doesn't have the athletic ability and jumping he did just a few years ago, he can't go prove people wrong. And, now he's stuck with justifying his contract with words instead of his play on the court. He's very sensitive when people criticize him and he can't prove them wrong. In fact, from 2003-05, Larry Brown used to set up the first play of the game to give the ball to Ben Wallace in the post. It wasn't because it was the best option or it guaranteed 2 points. It was because Ben was sensitive about the topic of him not being able to score. Larry Brown knew how to deal with Ben's ego.
Ben is definitely a sensitive person. He is still a self-made basketball player with no discernible skill but to rely on his athleticism and reaction time to make a difference on the court. And, now that those things are eroding, his sensitivity will be challenged even more.
I don't understand why Skiles won't let him wear a headband.
Nocioni wears a long black sleeve, Ben Gordon has tattoos...
I don't understand why Ben can't stop wearing a headband for $60 million.
sounds like the Bulls paid 60 mil for a negro.
Big Ben would look nice in the Silver & Black
Jazz have the same rule than Bulls concerning headbands.
If Spurs can find a way to turn Peter Holt into Mark Cuban, they should try to do a trade for Wallace.
BENGAY has a problem!
If this guy is dogging it because of a headband, there's no telling why else he would dog it.
you can't be serious!! The dude is unhappy because they won't let him wear the head band?? A 32 YEAR OLD ASS MAN ING ABOUT THEM NOT LETTING HIM WEAR A HEADBAND!?? , my high school coach wouldn't put up with that kind of from a 15 year old teenager and people are actually wondering why Skiles doesn't just let him wear the band... un- ing-believable!...
Not only is this jackass 32, but he's getting paid 15 million dollars a year, and STILL he's acting like a ing prima donna. I say the band, and Ben Wallace.
You know, some people say "why doesn't Skiles just allow Ben to wear a headband", and my answer is that if anyone should give in it should be Ben, what kind of message does that send to the team if Skiles bends to the pressure of Ben Wallace, and what kind of respect is he going to get from his young team for doing that?
Ben Wallace needs to be a man, accept the rules that were there before he got there, and take off the headband, this team is doing badly enough as it is, they don't need these silly distractions..
Didn't the Bulls start out horribly last year to? They seemed to do ok by the end of the season. Losing brings the worst out in people, and Ben is probably accustomed to winning a bit more now than he was earlier in his career.
Kind of a childish way to deal with it, but everyone has a character flaw.
Bulls are 4-9, last year they were 7-6 after thirteen games, certainly people expected more, and what Ben Wallace is doing isn't helping things at all...
Ben Wallace just dropped to the Marbury/Carter level of douchiocity.
Lol. A bunch of kids asking for Ben's autograph were all wearing red headbands.
It's not just about a headband. It's about being misled into the stipulations before sigining the contract. Both parties are at fault here - Ben should have gotten his facts straight before signing, and Skiles should realize that a true leader isn't some unyielding, stubborn, tyrant of a person who alienates the people he leads. A leader learns his team and knows how to compromise to help them be successful. Skiles is a very insecure person and as such will never be a good leader. A good leader has to be confident enough to know how to compromise. He is losing this team and will be fired within the next season or two. As much as I dislike Phil Jackson's coaching from an x's and o's standpoint - he is the imbodiment of a true leader. He knows how to lead a team of various personalities to achieve more than they ever could otherwise.
pleeeeaaase! compromise? why?? because one of your starting players is throwing a tantrum because he can't use a freaking headband? You're right about one thing though, the band isn't the issue here, Wallace is. Personally, I don't give a if a player wears a headband or not, but Skiles is the coach, if the coach tells you not to wear a headband, then simply don't wear one! why is that so hard?? Its not like the dude is getting his minutes taken away from him. We're not talking about a huge injustice that is being done on Wallace. The dude should just grow the up.
I don't agree with that at all, the stipulations of his contract were not that he couldn't wear a headband, rather they were that his job was to play basketball and as a player he answers directly to his coach, Skiles or anyone else.
That's a stupid argument because what if Skiles didn't ban headbands but the next coach did? Again his job is to answer directly to his coach and follow whatever rules he is given to follow.
Jerry Sloan does the same thing, and he's a great coach, so if Skiles isn't a good coach is has nothing to do with if he allows headbands or not, and the bottom line is that Ben Wallace shouldn't be wearing one, and he shouldn't be ignoring the rules his coach has set...
headbands keep sweat out of your eyes.
I would file a discrimination complaint against the Bulls. He probably would win.
Headbands aren't fashion statements.
Bulls shooting themselves in the foot. Who the is going to want to sign with them in the future with these terrible rules? They'll have to fork over a good hunk of money from now on for anyone with options.
NOBODY can wear a headband.
More than likely the players allowed Stern to be the final arbiter on these things, so he's boned.
Headbands are more important to him than the game. Way to go, Vince.
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