Derrick Rose appeared on the Club 520 Podcast recently where he shared how Kobe Bryant unknowingly ended up tricking him. Rose looked up to Bryant when he came to the NBA and adopted the mindset he thought the Los Angeles Lakers icon had, only to find out he was mistaken.
“At that time, I didn’t really enjoy anything,” Rose said. “I didn’t go out to eat with my family with friends like that. No movies, none of that. No concerts because I was totally locked into thinking that I had to follow what Kobe was doing. Thinking Kobe as not enjoying himself, not going on vacays, not doing any of that so I felt tricked in a way… My fourth year I ended up going to the Philippines with him.
“I saw him relax,” Rose added. “I’m like, ‘Oh you mother****** was tricking me this whole time. I dedicated three years. Three years of thinking you didn’t do s*** bruh and to see you actually out here just chilling.’ It kind of f***** me up but I couldn’t take it personally, ’cause he ain’t know I was admiring him like that.”
Bryant obviously had no idea Rose was living his life this way, so you can’t blame him for any of that. While the then-Chicago Bulls guard was shocked by what he saw, I’d say it was a good thing that these two ended up going on that trip.
Had Rose not accompanied Bryant, he would have continued living life in that miserable manner for many more years. You undoubtedly have to sacrifice a lot to become a great basketball player, as Kobe did, but it’s still important to have fun on occasion and spend time with loved ones when you can.
I’m glad Rose understood that on that trip. While I wouldn’t advise anyone to adopt the kind of mindset he had in those early years, it did seem to help him on the court.
Rose became the youngest MVP in NBA history when he won the award at the age of 22 in his third season. He put up impressive averages of 25.0 points, 4.1 rebounds, 7.7 assists, 1.0 steals, and 0.6 blocks per game in that 2010-11 campaign and it looked like he was going to be one of the dominant forces in the league for the years to come. Unfortunately, the injury bug struck the following year.
Rose tore his ACL in the first round of the 2012 playoffs and was never the same after that. It was also the beginning of an injury nightmare that seemingly lasted forever and it’s a pity we never got to see him at his absolute peak. Rose announced his retirement last month and you wonder how different recent NBA history would have been had he managed to stay healthy.
As for Bryant, well his own injury nightmare started around the same time as Rose’s. He tore his Achilles tendon toward the end of the 2012-13 season and that was the beginning of the end of his storied career. Kobe would battle one injury after another the rest of the way and retired in 2016.
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