I’ll be the first to admit that the whole 2010 free agency storyline is overblown and overdone. Yet, here I am, contributing to the frenzy like all the other enablers out there.
“It’s huge if one of them comes here,” Derrick Rose said last week on ESPN Radio 1000’s Waddle and Silvy show, of course referring to the possibility of the Bulls (31-28) attaining the services of a free agent like Lebron James, Dwayne Wade or Chris Bosh. Notice Kobe Bryant isn’t mentioned. That’s because nothing can convince me at this point that Bryant won’t retire as a Laker, despite his upcoming free-agent status.
But back to Rose’s quote: huge is an understatement.
It’s impossible to truly predict Rose’s ceiling as a player. But even a modest forecast has to assume that he’s a player who should be a top-three point guard in the NBA and make the all-star team for the next decade at least. Considering that, landing James, Wade, Bosh or even Joe Johnson would be more than huge. It could be historic. I’m talking dynasty part deux. For those readers wondering, “What’s in his pipe?” here’s an explanation:
Derrick Rose is going to be a superstar. Not just a star, not just an all-star — a superstar. He’s only a couple years away from being mentioned in the same breath as Dwayne Wade, a similar guard who Rose has all the tools to rival eventually.
His supporting cast has two players in Joahkim Noah and Luol Deng who are borderline all-star caliber players when at their best, and solid glue guys in guard Kirk Hinrich and rookie forward Taj Gibson. I won’t lie and say I know exactly what James Johnson will equate to in this league, but he has decent skills, size and athleticism, and with some toning down, added strength and work on his jumper, he could be an excellent complement off the bench or even an eventual starter at the wing.
Throw another top-shelf NBA talent into that equation, and you have a team that will be in title contention year in and year out.
The Bulls pulled out a close overtime win at home against the Portland Trailblazers on Friday. I was impressed by Rose’s swagger and willingness to be the “closer” at the end of the game, whereas last year he would have deferred to Ben Gordon and let the sweet-shooting guard take the big shots.
His midrange shot was decent when he played prep ball at Simeon in his hometown of Chicago, and he also connected from midrange at a respectable rate at Memphis (15-23 overall) — but the athletic point is starting to look downright frightening when he shoots it inside the three-point arc. Ask Portland.
Couple that with his already freakish ability to blow by almost anyone in the league, worm his way through traffic and finish with his crafty finger roll, impossible to block floater or the occasional thunderous dunk — and you’ve got a monster. The scary thing for the rest of the league is that Rose is improving rapidly and things can only get better for the second-year guard.
“Hopefully next year I’ll be shooting way more threes,” Rose said on ESPN 1000 last week. Hopefully he’ll be hitting them and not just shooting them. He’s shot 6-25 from beyond the arc this year and has taken less than 100 three-point shots between this season and last season.
And hopefully, next year he’ll be racking up way more assists too.
Honestly, I’ve never viewed Rose as an elite passer. And that isn’t a knock on his basketball IQ, which is pretty remarkable on offense for a sophomore. He often makes a good decision and then makes the right pass that eventually leads to an assist. Or he makes the right decision while the defense is keyed on him.
But he isn’t a disher in the mold of say, a Chris Paul or a Jason Kidd, an offensive maestro who makes other players look way better than they would without him and makes something out of nothing. Rose is most effective creating opportunities for himself that lead to opportunities for others.
Still, his average of just under six assists a game worries me. Just a bit. For someone who plays with the ball in his hands so much, I would like an assist average closer to eight a game.
But maybe I’m just greedy, ungrateful and impatient.
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