After 16 years in the NBA, former MVP point guard Derrick Rose is retiring from the league.
Option No.
Rose’s meteoric rise as one of the league’s most exciting players was thwarted by injuries; especially the ACL tear during the first round of the 2012 playoffs which was followed by a plethora of lower leg problems.
NBA insiders Chris Herring, Jamal Collier and Kevin Pelton break down the three-time All-Star career, including the legacy he left in Chicago and a unique case for the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame.
Brief Rose – but elite – prime there is electricity
In 2010, almost 14 years ago to the day, the 21-year-old Rose stood in front of Chicago reporters expressing his hopes for his third NBA season.
“High,” he said with a straight face. “The way I looked inside myself, why can’t I be the MVP of the league? Can’t I be the best player in the league? Can’t I do it? I work hard.”
It was an audacious comment. Yes, Rose won Rookie of the Year in 2009 and is one of the young stars to come out of the sport. But he had been an All-Star just once, selected for the game just seven months earlier. On a team scale, Chicago was a .500 club the previous season — another that generally made the MVP bid a little higher.
But at the end of the 2010-11 campaign, Rose looked like a prophet. The Bulls, who finished an NBA-best 62-20, were bolstered by new coach Tom Thibodeau. But no one is more responsible for that improvement than the electrifying Rose, who, while leading his hometown Bulls at age 22, became the youngest MVP in league history.
Between Chicago which is between the elite of the league and Rose reached meteoric heights in that early stage — Bulls also reached the finals of the future conference — it is natural to wonder what progress can look like; both for him and the team.
At that point, it’s possible, if not impossible, that he’ll be mentioned alongside Chicago star Michael Jordan or LeBron James — Rose’s Eastern Conference foe for a few years — in the basketball history books.
But before a series of knee injuries — an ACL in his left knee in 2012, a pair of tears in his right knee meniscus in 2013 and 2015 and a tear in his left meniscus in 2017 — sapped Rose of his trademark explosiveness. and changed the trajectory of his career.
Like Grant Hill, who suffered serious injuries in his prime for years before getting healthy and finishing his Hall of Fame career, Rose has flashed late in his NBA career. He had a very emotional 50-point game with Minnesota in 2018 and was a key contributor to the Knicks’ surprising playoff run in 2021, finishing third in Sixth Man of the Year voting.
These are not the glory years that the likes of James will remember. But for a few years and a few moments toward the end of his career, Rose’s incredible athleticism and playmaking made fans’ jaws drop. It is a highly unusual basketball journey, with massive height and impact. But everyone who sees it will remember it.
— Chris Herring
Rose’s legacy left in Chicago
The Bulls received the number 1 overall pick in the 2008 draft despite only having a 1.7% chance, which is a rare stroke of good luck for a franchise without success since Jordan’s Last Dance.
The fact that one of the top prospects available is from Chicago makes the decision clear. And his arrival will change the direction of the franchise dramatically.
Rose’s legacy in Chicago will live on not just for his accomplishments with the Bulls. He grew up poor in the city’s Englewood neighborhood and won a state championship in high school. Five years later, he took the Bulls to their only conference final in the last 25 years.
From Rookie of the Year, to All-Star to the youngest MVP in league history, the first three years of Rose’s career were an unmatched force, lifting Chicago to its best season since the Jordan era. His 36-point playoff debut in 2009 was electric and the Bulls took the defending champion Boston Celtics to seven games in a thrilling first-round series.
Goran Dragic’s dunk poster in 2010 was invigorating, a display of the kind of fear that made Chicago love him. In 2011, the Bulls were once again a contender. Rose turned to her mother when she signed a max year contract extension and said “Mom, we finally made it.”
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The injury that followed ended his story in Chicago and remains one of the most painful memories in the history of the city or the team. Rose sat out the entire 2012-13 season with a torn ACL and only played 10 games the following season as fans anticipated and questioned him back to the court every step of the way. While he was able to play, it was clear the injury changed his career. He was never able to maintain the expectations that were still high in Chicago.
Some of Rose’s key teammates from that era, Joakim Noah and Luol Deng, to this day will emphasize their belief that Chicago would have won the championship had injuries not betrayed Rose. This makes the Bulls team one of the “nothings” in NBA history.
As Rose’s career waned, and he bounced around the league from team-to-team, fans in Chicago still cheered him on when he came to the United Center as a visitor. It was as if they were still asking for one last chance at a happy hometown reunion.
– Jamal Collier
Rose’s unique case for the Hall of Fame
Rose may be the most interesting case the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame has ever seen. For decades, it was a given that every NBA MVP would go into the Hall of Fame. But Rose’s injury-shortened peak made his candidacy more complicated.
Among the 36 players who have won MVP, Rose’s three All-Star appearances are ahead of only the late Bill Walton (two), whose other wins saw his prime years marred by injury. While Walton played a handful of games between a navicular fracture that derailed his MVP campaign and turned 30, Rose was able to come back with a relatively full career but never again become an All-Star.
Unlike Walton, who led the Portland Trail Blazers to their only title in franchise history the year before his injury, Rose hasn’t had playoff success on the biggest stage. He averaged 23.4 points and 6.6 assists per game in the 2011 Eastern Conference finals at age 22, but shot just 35% as the Miami Heat beat the Bulls. A year later, Rose was injured in the first playoff game for Chicago, which had won a league-high 50 games during the lockout-shortened season but was upset by the No. 8 seed Philadelphia 76ers without him.
In this regard, the model added champion I see Spencer Haywood as the best comparison for Rose’s career. MVP of the ABA as a 20-year-old rookie, Haywood made All-NBA four times after successfully defying the league’s age limit and jumping to the Seattle SuperSonics. However, Haywood’s career was never the same after he injured his knee at age 25 and moved to the Knicks.
Haywood played a little longer than Rose, and totaled more than 15,000 career points (more than 17,000, including his ABA season), compared to Rose finished with 12,573. However, he had to wait until 2015 – 32 years after his retirement – to be inducted into the Hall of Fame, after several close calls.
As the Hall of Fame builds more networks under executive director Jerry Colangelo, I suspect Rose will build as well. Still, Rose’s recent injury makes Hall’s future less certain than any MVP winner in league history.
– Kevin Pelton
