The NBA's biggest brawler isn't who you think

The NBA's biggest brawler isn't who you think

When it comes to scandals and basketball, familiar names always pop up in the minds of fans of the game - Charles Barkley, Charles Oakley, everyone involved in Detroit's "Melee at the Palace" and so on. However, the most die-hard fans of the NBA also think of another person - Rasheed Wallace, or in other words "the bad boy of basketball".

Rasheed is one of the best guards in the game for the 21st century, a champion with the Detroit Pistons in 2004, but fans surely remember him most for his fiery temper and the line "ball don't lie" (note line . – the ball doesn't lie), which he utters after another basketball player's penalty line miss, after Wallace is convinced that he did not commit a foul.

To be such a good defender and energetic basketball player, however, Wallace has to sacrifice a lot, and his big mouth and rough defensive play cost him a lot of trouble with the referees and the league management, who regularly fined him for intemperate behavior.

Rasheed Wallace holds the NBA record for the most ejections from games - 29 times he left the floor prematurely for arguments with referees, flagrant fouls and what not. There's even an instance where the ref kicks him out of a game because Wallace stares at him for more than 10 seconds.

He also has another record on his account - in the 2000/01 season, when he was in the Portland Trailblazers team, he recorded as many as 41 technical fouls on his account - an achievement that no one even dared to improve. Because of his behavior this season, the NBA introduced a new rule - if a player receives 15 technical fouls, he is automatically suspended for 1 game. However, he never stops with his nagging of referees, fouls and constant "bad" behavior.

In his 18-year NBA career, Rasheed Wallace recorded 317 technical fouls. On the all-time list, he is "just" third, with Charles Barkley (329) and Karl Malone (332) above him, but both have significantly more games and minutes played than Wallace.