A bold prediction

If Detroit Pistons forward Rasheed Wallace wants to wrest the mantle of World's Greatest Psychic away from Sylvia Browne, he's going to have to do a lot more than predict that the Cavs aren't going to win a playoff series. The NBA world is agog with word of the latest "guarant-Sheed," in which Wallace apparently turned into a burning bush and said, "(Game 4) will be the last game played in this building this year."

WOW! Rasheed Wallace has declared that a Cleveland team will lose a playoff series, which is one step removed from predicting that he will put his right shoe on his right foot before tonight's Game 4 begins. Apparently, Wallace has made three other "guarant-Sheeds," all of which came true. They were, in order of greatness:

"Water will come out of this faucet when I turn this handle," he told his high school girlfriend in 1991.

"When I throw this ball up in the air, watch, and it will come right back down to me," he told an amazed 5-year-old before the first game of the NBA Finals two years ago.

"That 'Emily's Reasons Why Not' show ain't gonna last three episodes," he told Rip Hamilton while watching the NFL playoffs.

Wallace's prediction is so amazing that every single Plain Dealer writer picked the Pistons to win this series in five games, as did three of five ESPN.com writers. Those picks were made more than a week ago.

If Rasheed Wallace really wanted to be remembered, he would have predicted that this is the week the Indians get healthy. After all, the Royals (10-25) and Pirates (11-27) own the two worst records in baseball. They're here for seven games. The Tribe could very well be 24-21 in a week, the skies will clear, the sun will shine, and Cleveland will rejoice in a summer on the shores of Lake Erie. Or it could be football season.

But Wallace would rather be right than be remembered, so he will have none of that. Not when the Royals (5-1 against the Tribe, 5-24 against the rest of baseball) are part of the problem, not part of the solution. Not when Wallace's Detroit brethren, the Tigers, just completed their first sweep in Cleveland since Len Barker's perfect game, errrrrrrrrrrrrr, 1990. Not when six straight losses have sent the Indians sinking into the quicksand of the 2006 season; they've dropped to fourth, closer to last place (5½ games) than to first (8 games).

There's someone much more omniscient than Rasheed Wallace who's been making predictions about Cleveland sports for the past 40-plus years. His name is God, and every year he makes the same pick -- you lose.