My 914 has been sitting in the garage WAY longer than anticipated. when i got it home (on a trailer) i notice the shifter has lots of play. then one day i decided to removed shifter to inspect and found little round piece of rubber, what looks like could be a bushing. is there a bushing that surrounds the shift rod ?

Yes, there are several throughout the shift linkage.

If your 72 doesn't have a later setup swapped in, it will have a "tail shift" transmission. Lots of bushings that can fail and allow slop.

There's a tech article in the 914 section of the Pelican Parts site about improving the tail-shift linkage. Might be worth a look...

--DD