Gone: Shaq, Dwight Howard, Darko Milicic (don’t laugh), Chris Bosh (soon).

Still remaining: Ben Wallace, P.J. Brown, Drew Gooden, Zydrunas Ilgauskas, Mikki Moore.

There is no opposition remaining in the 2007 Eastern Conference Playoffs for Rasheed Wallace. Wallace should use the remainder of this postseason, an assumed run to the NBA Finals, as a way to put everyone on notice that he is still one of the premier big men in the League.

There should be none of that “float around the three-point line and launch a deep three” in his game — at least until next season. Rasheed should plant his big backside on either low block and go to work. Wallace is the only post player remaining in the East half of the bracket who can command a double team, which would free up his teammates for open looks. Him launching 25-foot bombs six times a game doesn’t.

Rasheed’s performance on offense — he should be able to rest somewhat on defense until the Finals if you look at what he'll be matched up against — will be the X-factor in Detroit having to work through a couple of six- or seven-games series leading up to the Finals, or in the Pistons plowing through lesser competition on their way to their third Finals appearance in four years.

That’s not to stay Chicago, Detroit’s second-round opponent, will be a pushover. The Bulls did beat the Pistons in three of four regular-season meetings. But that was the regular season — the time of year that allegedly doesn’t matter to anyone on Detroit’s roster.

Don’t get it twisted. This East semi is the conference final. Whichever team wins the series between Cleveland and New Jersey/Toronto will only serve as a practice squad for the Pistons or Bulls.

The match-ups are intriguing. Both squads’ perimeter players (Chicago’s Kirk Hinrich, Ben Gordon and Luol Deng and Detroit’s Chauncey Billups, Richard Hamilton and Tayshaun Prince) are going to have to get it done on both ends of the floor.

Deng and Gordon (51.7 ppg) currently make up the highest scoring tandem in the ’07 playoffs. The Pistons high-scoring duo, Billups and Hamilton, are netting 42.4 a night this postseason. The Bulls’ young guns will have to be slowed if Detroit wants to make its fifth consecutive conference finals appearance. It should help the Pistons since their perimeter trio is a combined 467 years younger than what Miami trotted out in its first-round sweep at the hands of the Baby Bulls. It should also help Chicago since Hinrich, the Bulls starting point guard, doesn't dribble 76 times before he takes a bad jumper, a la Jameer Nelson.

All of those guys will need in-game rest of they’re going to be chasing each other around for the next two weeks, which means both benches must perform throughout the series, too.

The Bulls’ subs have chipped in with 21.8 ppg so far this postseason (Andres Nocioni poured in 12 a game), while Detroit’s bench, which has been much maligned the two previous second seasons for lack of usage, netted 14 ppg during a four-game sweep of Orlando. That may not be a huge number, but reserves Antonio McDyess, Carlos Delfino and Ronald Murray averaged 23.3, 12.3, and 12.3 minutes a game, respectively, during that Orlando series. The team’s Methuselah, Dale Davis, even got about 10 minutes of burn in the three games he played in. This means Detroit’s starters got at least a quarter of rest in each game of the first round. That could be a telling stat when you consider how spent Piston starters were in the ’05 Finals.

The two teams' starting frontcourts are far from mirror images. Like Pacman Jones and Warrick Dunn. The Bulls starting 4 and 5, Ben Wallace and Brown, averaged 15.8 points and 14.3 boards a game in the first round, where they had to deal with Shaq, Alonzo Mourning and Udonis Haslem. Rasheed and Chris Webber, however, averaged 27.3 and 15.6 in the first round. Yes, I know Ben and P.J. weren’t brought in for their offensive prowess, but it helps any team in a quest for a title when it can dump the ball into the post and be confident that a pivot man can get a bucket.

Ben Wallace’s defense and toughness are what netted him a four-year, $60 million deal last July 4. That defense brings me back to his old running buddy.

Big Ben made his reputation as a help defender. Yea, I’ve seen him pick up guards full court, but Ben is a throwback big man — he doesn’t like stepping out of the paint. He’ll do it, but he’d rather not. Having played with him for two-and-a-half seasons, Rasheed should recognize this and exploit it the entire series.

If Rasheed does elect to play small forward during this series, Ben won't be in position to help his new running mates out in the lane, which would enable Hamilton rub off screens and get uncontested mid-range jumper after jumper.

If "Roscoe" decides to showcase his low post game, Chicago will be forced to double him, leaving whoever's on the perimeter open for what would turn into shooting practice.

Assuming Wallace takes advantage of the mismatch over a seven-game series, you can pretty much pencil the Pistons in to be playing in mid-June. Jason Collins and Anderson Varejao just don’t do anything for me. And they shouldn’t be able to do anything with Rasheed.