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With Butler on his way out, Derrick Rose has moved into the starting lineup as a small two. He played last night and looked pretty spry.



That's coming off an impressive playoff showing where he averaged 14 points in only 24 minutes off the bench, and looked great doing it:

Watch on YouTube

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I've been down on Rose for many years now, but I'm starting to become a little intrigued by him again. At 30, he still could have several productive years ahead of him. His early preseason play even has Karl Anthony Towns excited:

"He was fabulous. Derrick showed a lot of prime Rose. The Rose everyone loves. Very aggressive, making the tough plays and pushing the tempo. ... For me personally on the court I saw a lot of glimpses of MVP D-Rose."

Taj is even starting to notice difference in Rose:

“I see him just coming in, getting his lifts in, things in the past I didn’t really notice too well his first couple years, because he was just young and athletic,” Gibson said. “When you get older and have been in the league 10-plus (years), you have to adjust, stay in the weight room, monitor your body, stay on top of yourself, stay in shape, eat right. Those things Derrick has been doing. You can tell. I’m following his lead after practice.”

With all this said, what kind of season are you expecting from Rose? It wasn't too long ago that he was putting up 18 a game, which seems like a reasonable goal. Is he at a point in his recovery where he could compete for Most Improved Player?

Jump shooting rose before the MVP year.

Watch Thibs, Rose, Deng and Taj take the Wolves back to the playoffs without Jimmy.

i think he may have turned a corner.
he looked good.
happy for him (still rock my #1 jersey )

I think this will be Rose's best season since the injuries. I think he's found his niche as that 2nd unit combo guard, and watching his game last night, I think people underrate how much he actually has worked on his game and adapted. He's playing off-ball a bit more, focusing on defense, and getting buckets. I think he'll shoot the 3 pretty well (not on a super high volume or anything) as well.

GimmeDat wrote:I think this will be Rose's best season since the injuries. I think he's found his niche as that 2nd unit combo guard, and watching his game last night, I think people underrate how much he actually has worked on his game and adapted. He's playing off-ball a bit more, focusing on defense, and getting buckets. I think he'll shoot the 3 pretty well (not on a super high volume or anything) as well.

I neee you to reword your post and say he will average 24ppg while showing he can be electric again or you will be forcing me to ban you for your obvious troll of a post (be realistic!)

Hes not going to be good imo. Hes a inefficient scorer with tunnel vision and bad defense.

Why can’t he be the MVP of the league? Why can’t he be the best player in the league? I don’t see why not. Why can’t he do that?

Out for the year by February. Flashes of greatness punctuate mediocrity between now and then.

I hope he has his renaissance, but I'm not optimistic.

Hopefully, a healthy one and that's all that matters. Still hoping he can go out on a high note after all the crap.

He’ll have a great season, but no where near as dynamic as MVP Rose.

His driving ability is what made him such a lethal floor general. His midrange looks polished again, so he can be a 22 and 5 sort of player (ceiling), but more likely a 17 and 4 player. I hope that he proves me wrong.

bledredwine wrote:He’ll have a great season, but no where near as dynamic as MVP Rose.

His driving ability is what made him such a lethal floor general. His midrange looks polished again, so he can be a 22 and 5 sort of player (ceiling), but more likely a 17 and 4 player. I hope that he proves me wrong.

MVP rose is long gone but he showed some of that electricity on the pass breakup to Durant I think it was

derrick rose is about to be 30 and has been thrust into the starting lineup of a team in disarray? oof

gotta feel bad for thibs. what a nightmare. it might just take one instance of seeing KAT and wiggins goofing off in the locker room to send him into a nervous breakdown

Really looking forward to watching him this year

Something seemed spunky about him the other night....hoping he can have a breakout year and become a solid top 10 PG again

bledredwine wrote:He’ll have a great season, but no where near as dynamic as MVP Rose.

His driving ability is what made him such a lethal floor general. His midrange looks polished again, so he can be a 22 and 5 sort of player (ceiling), but more likely a 17 and 4 player. I hope that he proves me wrong.

If Rose is averaging 22 ppg that means Towns and Wiggins are out for the year and Rose is chucking up 20 shots per game.

Tenchi Ryu wrote:Really looking forward to watching him this year

Something seemed spunky about him the other night....hoping he can have a breakout year and become a solid top 10 PG again

He had a lot of energy. The important thing was that he really looked like he was having fun playing the game. I haven't seen that from him in a long time. I think he's going to have a good season and finally stay healthy. Taj said that he is really taking good care of himself for the first time ever. Eating right and stretching and doing the little things.

johnnyvann840 wrote:

Tenchi Ryu wrote:Really looking forward to watching him this year

Something seemed spunky about him the other night....hoping he can have a breakout year and become a solid top 10 PG again

He had a lot of energy. The important thing was that he really looked like he was having fun playing the game. I haven't seen that from him in a long time. I think he's going to have a good season and finally stay healthy. Taj said that he is really taking good care of himself for the first time ever. Eating right and stretching and doing the little things.

It's better late than never that he is taking better care of himself, but it also annoys me because he was our franchise player and I always thought he took his health and conditioning more seriously. Quite disappointing really.

Which makes me believe that the injuries took more of a toll on him mentally than physically, which affected him on the basketball court. All players who go through serious injuries say that you're confidence gets shook quite significantly, and you feel that your body has betrayed you. If it's true that he never really took after himself all that well in the past, I can only imagine that he felt he couldn't trust his body that much more which made him an average player in his return.

Like I've said in a different thread, I wish he turns it around and becomes an All-star again, and somehow leads the Wolves into the playoffs, that would be such a fantastic comeback story, and something which could get him back in the talks of a possible hall of fame birth and turn his career around.

I just hope he's healthy and able to contribute. Being back with Thibs and out of the spotlight in Minny hopefully is a great positive for him.

Rose was MVP because he was able to physically dominate other PG's while having above average basketball skills.

Playing SG in Minny, he just has above average basketball skills...and a legacy.

An inefficient, injury riddled season. Why would anybody expect anything else? I didn't think he showed much in those highlights. He made some mid range jumpers and made a couple hustle defensive plays when everybody else around him was going less than full speed.

Athletically, he's just a shell of himself. Not nearly as quick and his explosion isn't there. The phrase "busted tire" comes to mind watching him.

That said, I hope he stays healthy and has a great year. Just seems quite unlikely.