It’s 2008 and the city of Chicago is waiting for the lottery balls to fall. The team has a long shot to land the No. 1 pick but somehow the team finds themselves in the position with two teams left. Finally, the Chicago Bulls are seen as the team that landed the No. 1 overall pick. The whole area erupts because a man by the name of Derrick Rose is projected as the top pick of the draft. Rose, a four-time All-American at Chicago Siemon Academy, was a hometown hero that was coming off an NCAA Championship appearance at Memphis. This could be the Cinderella story that any young kid dreams about having.
The Bulls created that story. The team took the Chicago kid with the No. 1 overall pick. By 2010, Rose was an All-Star, and then the following season Rose became the youngest MVP ever. His age of 22 years and six months beat the previous record held by Wes Unseld (23 years and two months) when he won the MVP Award during the 1968-69 season. The world was his oyster until Rose sustained career-altering injuries beginning in the 2012 playoffs.
Since 2012, Rose has yet to make an All-Star appearance, make an All-NBA Team, or win any NBA award for that matter. While it’s admirable that Rose continues to play in the NBA despite his adversity, there is a glowing question looming as he gets older. At 34 years old and with dwindling playing time, Rose could be out of the league as soon as next season. That could open up the conversation about the future.
Rose will likely be a player on the Hall of Fame ballot when that time comes, but is Rose a Hall of Famer? The MVP Award stretches back to the 1955-56 season. Every single player on that list up to 2006 has been inducted into the Hall of Fame. The 2006-07 winner, Dirk Nowitzki, has not been eligible yet, while the 2007-08 winner Kobe Bryant was inducted after his death. After that, the list includes LeBron James, Kevin Durant, Stephen Curry, Russell Westbrook, James Harden, Giannis Anteokounmpo, and Nikola Jokic. It’s probably safe to say that all of these players will likely be in the Hall of Fame with Nowitzki.
That leaves one MVP left to discuss. When we look back a few years from now, could Derrick Rose be the only MVP not included in the Hall of Fame? We take a look at his resume and the last voting cycles and determine if that could be the case. In the end, it’s going to come down to if Rose did enough early to warrant his inclusion into the greatest honor post-basketball a player can receive.
Derrick Rose’s Resume
The highlight of Rose’s career came from 2008 to 2012. During that span, Rose won the Rookie of the Year Award with a line of 16.8 points and 6.3 assists, including a near upset of the No. 1 seed Boston Celtics in the playoffs. He followed that with an All-Star appearance in 2009-10 when he averaged 20.8 points, 3.8 rebounds, and 6.0 assists. Rose captured the MVP Award the following year with 25.0 points, 4.1 rebounds, 7.7 assists, and 1.0 steals per game. His third consecutive All-Star appearance featured 21.8 points, 3.4 rebounds, and career-high 7.9 assists.
The 2011 and 2012 playoffs featured the Bulls as the No. 1 seed. Keep in mind that the surrounding core featured Luol Deng, Carlos Boozer, and Joakim Noah, among other solid players. These teams won more games than the Miami Heat, who were led by LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, and Chris Bosh. While the Heat defeated the Bulls in the 2011 Conference Finals, it’s the only true measuring stick we have of these two rivals when Rose was healthy. The 2011 playoffs remain the only time since Michael Jordan left the team in 1998 that the team has made it that far into the playoffs.
As mentioned, Rose has not won any major NBA accolades since 2012. Rose suffered a torn ACL in his left knee and a torn meniscus in his right knee since the 2012 playoffs. With two major knee injuries, this limited Rose to 61 games between 2012 and 2015. Despite this, Rose has averaged at least 18.0 points with three different teams (Knicks, Timberwolves, and Pistons) since leaving Chicago in 2016.
It’s easy to point at his awards and say that he does not deserve them from that sheer point of view. Rose owns the MVP Award (2011), three All-Star appearances (2010-2012), one All-NBA First Team (2011), and a Rookie of the Year (2011). That is not a lot in the grand scheme compared to other Hall of Fame players. Was what he did accomplish in that four-year window enough of an argument?
In Comparison To Others
Let’s look at the last 10 years worth of NBA Hall of Fame classes and go through the players only from those classes, so we have an idea of where the voters have voted as of recently.
2013: Gary Payton, Bernard King, Roger Brown, Oscar Schmidt, Richard Geurin
2014: Alonzo Mourning, Mitch Richmond, Guy Rodgers
2015: Louie Dampier, John Isaacs, Dikembe Mutombo, Jo Jo White
2016: Zelmo Beaty, Allen Iverson, Yao Ming, Shaquille O’Neal, Cumberland Posey
2017: Tracy McGrady, Zach Clayton, Nick Galis, George McGinnis
2018: Ray Allen, Maurice Cheeks, Grant Hill, Jason Kidd, Steve Nash, Dino Radja, Charlie Scott
2019: Carl Braun, Charles Cooper, Bobby Jones, Sidney Moncrief, Jack Sikma, Paul Westphal
2020: Kobe Bryant, Tim Duncan, Kevin Garnett
2021: Chris Bosh, Paul Pierce, Bill Russell, Ben Wallace, Chris Weber, Toni Kukoc, Bob Dandridge, Clarence Jenkins
2022: Manu Ginobili, Tim Hardaway, Lou Hudson
There are a few names that stand out Bernard King, Guy Rodgers, Yao Ming, Tracy McGrady, Grant Hill, Chris Webber, and Tim Hardaway. If you take out the special circumstance players that do not have NBA stats but were inducted into the Hall of Fame, these are the next tier group of players that had solid careers in the league that could be in a similar conversation as Rose. None of these players won an MVP Award. Some of these players were not necessarily superstars while others dealt with lingering injuries in their careers.
Let’s take a moment and break down the list of awards for each player in comparison to Rose.
Derrick Rose: 1 MVP Award, 3x All-Star, 1 All-NBA First Team, Rookie of the Year, All-Rookie First Team
Bernard King: 4x All-Star, 2x All-NBA First Team, 1 All-NBA Second Team, 1 All-NBA Third Team, NBA Comeback Player of the Year, All-Rookie First Team, Scoring Champion
Guy Rodgers: 4x All-Star, 2x Assists Leader
Yao Ming: 8x All-Star, 2x All-NBA Second Team, 3x All-NBA Third Team, All-Rookie First Team
Tracy McGrady: 7x All-Star, 2x All-NBA First Team, 3x All-NBA Second Team, 2x All-NBA Third Team, Most Improved Player, 2x Scoring Champion
Grant Hill: 7x All-Star, All-NBA First Team, 4x All-NBA Second Team, Co-Rookie of the Year, All-Rookie First Team
Chris Webber: 5x All-Star,1 All-NBA First Team, 3x All-NBA Second Team, All-NBA Third Team, Rookie of the Year, All-Rookie First Team, Rebounding Leader
Tim Hardaway: 5x All-Star, 1 All-NBA First Team, 3x All-NBA Second Team, 1 All-NBA Third Team, All-Rookie First Team
Now that we have some variables to compare let’s dive in. For starters, players like Yao Ming and Tracy McGrady are two perfect examples of players inducted into the Hall of Fame who had to retire early due to injuries. What separates them from Rose is that both accomplished a lot during their time healthy. Ming dealt with injuries consistently and still made pushes for All-Star Games because of his play. We can’t use Ming or McGrady because both accomplished more in their careers.
Grant Hill is another example of a player that dealt with injuries in his career. Hill’s time with the Magic was marred by injuries, and his career took a hit because of it. Hill also slightly owns an advantage over Rose because he has four more All-Star appearances and four more All-NBA selections. With that said, Hill’s injury was later in his career compared to the four seasons into Rose’s career.
Bernard King, Chris Webber, and Tim Hardaway bring a very interesting conversation to the table. King owns one more All-Star appearance but two more All-NBA selections. Both Webber and Hardaway own two more All-Star appearances and have one All-NBA First Team, too but have three more All-NBA appearances. How much is the MVP Award worth in your eyes? Does winning one MVP Award equal the same as maybe two All-NBA Second Team choices? Does that mean that both players have just a slight edge because of the extra All-NBA nod? Rose might not have the few extra individual awards, but his MVP Award meant he was the best, not one of the best, but the very best in the league.
The Final Decision
There are two reasons why Rose will make the Hall of Fame one day. The first reason is players like Guy Rodgers and Lou Hudson. Both players played in the 60s and 70s, a completely different period. Rodgers made four All-Star appearances and zero selections on the All-NBA Team. Hudson made six All-Star appearances and one All-NBA Second Team. Their careers featured many fruitful seasons, but neither was inducted into the Hall of Fame right away.
The politics of looking back on history does not go unnoticed. These players may not have been seen as Hall of Famers back then because there were other superstars at the time. Because they were overshadowed, they were not going to get the attention they deserved. Rose is over a decade away from being that superstar. Fans in Chicago will always remember him, but for this new generation, he is a backup point guard that can score in the double figures sometimes. When time evolves, and those looking back at what he did with the Bulls along from 2008 to 2016, the injury is going to be a huge component.
Now, you can’t just induct a player into the Hall of Fame because an injury hampered his career. Then, we might be talking about the “what if” scenarios for guys like Brandon Roy and Greg Oden. The second point to this argument is congruent with what the injury did to the Bulls franchise as a whole. Rose was an All-Star and MVP when he went down. He was 23 years old and a generational player. The Bulls were the No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference. It’s the argument of what would happen if you took LeBron James off of the Cavaliers or Heat or Kobe Bryant off the Lakers from 2008 to 2010. We never saw that hypothetical with those teams in their prime of contention. The Bulls lived through it with Rose from 2012 to 2014.
When historians and voters look back at the fall of the Bulls after Rose was out, it’s undeniable how much the Bulls suffered. The team went from a one-seed to a five and four-seed. The team was competitive because of the coaching staff, but it wasn’t a contender. Because there are so many people in this world that believe the Bulls would have a championship had Rose never been injured will help Rose’s resume. Because Rose won the MVP Award at such a young age, it validates that he was a special player. Because of his injury and his career after it, this also validates that this was a special player, as well as the team’s dropoff in contention for years later while he was recovering.
In the end, Rose will not be elected into the Hall of Fame right away. This is not a sure-in vote like Tim Duncan, Shaquille O’Neal, and the future LeBron James. This will take time, but if other players with similar resumes can get in decades later, Rose has a chance. However, the initial question is Derrick Rose a Hall of Famer? The MVP Award has been handed out 67 times, and only 35 players, if you do not count repeated winners, have ever earned it. Winning this meant you were one of the best. The fact Rose was the best, he continued his career and played well, and that the Bulls showed the repercussions of his absence should be enough to prove Rose deserves to be in the Hall of Fame one day.
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