Portland Trail Blazers GM John Nash perhaps knows forwards Kenyon Martin and Rasheed Wallace better than most.  After all, he had a hand in both's path into the NBA.

Steve Popper of the New York Times writes it was Nash who followed Wallace through his high school days in Philadelphia and then drafted him in 1995 with the fourth overall pick of the first round for Washington.  It was also Nash who made the selection of Martin for the Nets after scouting him while he played for Cincinatti.

So which does he think has the upper hand as the pair are scheduled to go head to head?  The answer is Martin.

After all, Nash spent a good part of last summer trying to trade Wallace, then a Trail Blazer, to the Nets so he could put Martin in a Portland uniform.

"Last summer, I made a concerted effort to get him," said Nash, who finally traded Wallace just before the deadline this season to Atlanta, which then sent him to Detroit. "It just didn't work out. Their salaries didn't match up, and I don't know that the Nets would make that deal straight up anyway.

"In a one-game situation, one series, Rasheed is capable of outplaying Kenyon," Nash said. "He's immensely talented, bigger and longer. But the old adage goes that it's not the size of the dog in the fight, but the size of the fight in the dog, and Kenyon is far more tenacious.

"He doesn't have as much talent as some I've been around, but toughness. . . . Tim Thomas is lucky he didn't go in that phone booth."