“He was Chicago”—Joakim Noah on how Derrick Rose gave hope to the entire city

Former Bulls center Joakim Noah appeared in a recent episode of JJ Redick’s ‘The Old Man and The Three‘ podcast and explained why one-time NBA MVP Derrick Rose means so much to Chicago.

“First of all, he was a hometown kid, so he was from the hood, from the South Side. And he’s from Chicago. Some people say they’re from Chicago, they’re not really from Chicago, they’re from the outskirts. There’s a lot of those... that doesn’t count. He was Chicago. And, I don’t care, his run at his peak, if you’re from Chicago, you wanted it to be that. You wanted to be the number one pick from the Bulls, having that building rocking the way that he did. And the hope was real, the hope all around the city,” Noah said.

Rose and Noah’s bond goes well beyond basketball

Rose and Noah played together on the Bulls, and they had a lot of success in the regular season. They were also teammates on the Knicks one year. The two Bulls legends have not played in a game with each other since the 2016-17 season, but they have a close bond beyond basketball.

“It’s deeper than basketball,” Rose told reporters on Joakim Noah Night on October 28, 2021. “Our families are pretty close. My mom and his mom are. Even in New York, everything that I do is based around his friends helping out, his family helping out. His best friend Matt (Rosenberg) is always around. My daughter and his daughter are best friends. So it came full circle. It’s crazy that I’m in New York now where he grew up. It’s perfect.”

What if...?

Rose averaged 25 points, 7.7 assists, and 4.1 rebounds in 37.4 minutes over 81 games in 2010-11 to become the youngest player to earn the NBA MVP award (22 years, 191 days old), but in the following years, serious injuries almost ended his promising career and he couldn’t lead the Bulls to their first NBA championship since the Michael Jordan era.

An injury-free career would have made Rose one of the best point guards of all time and possibly an NBA champion but one thing is certain, his story will keep inspiring fans in Chicago and all over the world for years to come.