Rasheed Wallace announces retirement

BOSTON — The Rasheed Wallace reign in Boston is over, probably sooner than most expected.

A league source confirmed Thursday night that Wallace, who signed a three-year, $18.9 million contract with the Celtics last summer, will retire after just one season.

Wallace's retirement was first reported by NBA.com.

The 35-year-old leaves nearly $13 million on the table.

Wallace's retirement is not a surprise considering head coach Doc Rivers said as much following Boston's Game Seven loss to the Los Angeles Lakers in the NBA Finals.

Boston's president of basketball operations Danny Ainge reiterated Wallace's likely retirement earlier this week.

Wallace's conditioning has been an issue throughout most of his NBA career, and it certainly played a role in his struggles during the regular season.

However, the playoffs seemed to bring about a new, more invigorated Wallace, who played with the kind of inside-outside game along with a strong defensive presence, that the C's were looking for when the Big Three as well as key members within the basketball operations staff and ownership paid an in-home visit to him last summer.

In his lone season with the Cs, Wallace averaged nine points per game along with 4.1 rebounds in 22.5 minutes - all career lows.

With Wallace's retirement, the Celtics must now look to add another big man to fill the void.

Currently the Celtics have three big men under contract - Glen Davis, Kevin Garnett and Kendrick Perkins. And Perkins is out indefinitely following a torn MCL and PCL injury suffered in Game Six of the NBA Finals.

A. Sherrod Blakely can be reached at sblakely@comcastsportsnet.com. Follow Sherrod on Twitter at http://twitter.com/sherrodbcsn