Derrick Rose Surges Ahead of Rajon Rondo In All-Star Game Voting

There is probably no player in the NBA who was already an All-Star who improved his game more from last year to this than Derrick Rose. It's been a thorn in Chicago's side that as brilliantly as he has been playing, he's been trailing Rajon Rondo in the All-Star voting. 

With today's third announcement of the voting though, there's good news for Chicago Bulls fans as D-Rose increased in the votes. He now ranks second among guards with 1,225,575 votes to Rondo's 1,171,311 votes. The lead of nearly 55,000 votes is larger than the 12,000 vote lead Rondo had after the second announcements were made. 

While Rondo has been leading the league in assists, Rose has been having one of the best seasons by a scoring point guard in a very long time. His present pace of over 24 points per game and eight assists would have him as the first player in a decade to accomplish that feat. 

If the current leaders remain the same, Rose would be running an All-Star team with Dwyane Wade as the shooting guard, LeBron James at the small forward, Amar'e Stoudemire as the power forward and Dwight Howard as the starting center. 

Perhaps for the first time in a long time, the Eastern Conference might have the edge in their matchup with the West, at least among the starters. As it stands now, Chris Paul would be running the team with Kobe Bryant as the starting shooting guard, Kevin Durant and Carmelo Anthony filling the forward spots the center spot going to Yao Ming, who will not be able to play. Currently Andrew Bynum is the second leading vote-getter, but that doesn't mean he would get the start. 

If you still want to vote and haven't voted yet, you can text the name of the player you want to vote for (Rose) to "MYNBA" (69622). Vote the Chicago way, early and often, to make sure that Derrick Rose can hold on to that starting spot.