Derrick Rose's 'Minor' Ankle Sprain Is No Reason for Chicago Bulls to Panic
CHICAGO—Derrick Rose wasted no time showing us the shape The Return 2.0 will take.
The Chicago Bulls’ 114-108 overtime loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers in their home opener was everything that Rose’s latest comeback will be: a lot of promise, a minor setback and an exercise in patience.
With about four minutes to go in the second quarter, Rose landed awkwardly on Kyrie Irving’s foot after missing a floater. He hobbled for a few seconds while the rest of the team ran back on defense, and the United Center went dead silent. They’d seen this movie before.
But Rose walked it off and stayed in the next time Tom Thibodeau made a substitution. He started the third quarter, too, but quickly came out and didn’t return.
The diagnosis was a right ankle sprain, and that will be the story. But Rose's debut left a lot of room for optimism. In his 25 minutes, he had 20 points on 8-for-16 shooting with four rebounds and four assists.
And he looked great doing it. He blew past Matthew Dellavedova for a layup. He drew a charge on Irving. He hit a pull-up three off the dribble. He had no trouble getting anywhere he wanted on the court. The explosiveness was all there.
He looked like himself.
The most important thing for the Bulls will be Rose still looking like himself in April, May and June. If this was a playoff game, he probably would have come back in. But if he isn’t feeling 100 percent, there’s no point in playing him in a game that doesn’t mean a whole lot. This injury will dominate a news cycle, and the mild inconvenience of being asked about it for the next few days is a price he’s perfectly willing to pay.
“It’s basketball,” he said. “It’s not like I tore a ligament or something. I sprained my ankle and I had to sit out. It’s minor. I’m walking around, so I think everyone can breathe.”
There are going to be setbacks for Rose and the Bulls. He knows that, and so does Thibodeau. He was adamant after the game that he's leaving all decisions on minutes to the team's training staff, and he's stressed throughout training camp that Rose is a work in progress.
"It’s two years now with the ACL," Thibodeau said in September. "I think he’s gotten the confidence back in that knee, but he’s got to shake a lot of rust off."
He’s been off for two consecutive seasons with serious knee injuries. He needs time to get his conditioning back. There will be planned rest days and minor nicks and bruises, and every single one of them will make it that much harder for him to escape the skepticism about his ability to stay healthy.
As disappointing as it was to see Rose unable to finish the game, it was still only one game at the beginning of the regular season. It may have come against a Cavaliers team that most expect the Bulls to face in the Eastern Conference Finals in May, but it was just one game, nonetheless. He may or may not play in Minnesota against the Timberwolves on Saturday. That’s just one game, too, and not against a very good team.
“I’m going to go to Minnesota and try to give it a go tomorrow,” Rose said after the game. “If not, we’ve still got 80 more games to go.”
Rose made his controversial decision to sit out the entire 2012-13 season with the long term in mind. If the Bulls weren't competing for a title, he wasn't going to risk his career. The same dynamic is at play here, on a smaller scale. There's no reason Rose should feel compelled to play against a team the Bulls would probably beat without him if there's a higher risk of injury.
With the talent the Bulls have, they can afford to be conservative with Rose’s minutes. They hung with the Cavs through overtime down not only Rose, but Jimmy Butler as well. They will play 15 games in the month of November, and only three of them (against the Toronto Raptors, Portland Trail Blazers and Los Angeles Clippers) feature opponents that are likely playoff teams.
He may have to sit out a game here or there against a team like Orlando or Philadelphia as a precaution. Those games will reignite the cycle of panic that surrounds everything Rose does these days. He can deal with that. Rose and his teammates all believe this is a championship-caliber team, and their ultimate goal is to be playing in June. Rose playing in a Conference Finals game against Cleveland or a Finals game against San Antonio is more important than him playing in a regular-season game in November against Milwaukee.
When you’re a run-of-the-mill NBA player, a sprained ankle is part of the job description. When you’re a former league MVP coming off two consecutive season-ending knee surgeries, it’s just another annoyance. But with everything Rose has been through in the past two years, a twisted ankle isn’t something he’s going to lose sleep over.
Sean Highkin covers the Chicago Bulls for Bleacher Report.
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