“I don’t really like talking about myself,” Rose says. “To me it’s more like, ‘Did we win or did we lose?’ Anything else you talk about doesn’t matter.”
Indeed, Rose and his Bulls did more winning than any other team during the regular season—a 62-20 record, in fact. That, along with his play, was enough for Rose to win Sporting News’ player of the year award.
He received 179 votes from SN’s panel of 214 players, putting him well ahead of Dwight Howard (10 votes), Kobe Bryant (nine), Kevin Durant (five) and LeBron James (four). And get this: Rose is only 22.
If Rose doesn’t want to talk about himself, though, that’s no problem. Plenty of other people will.
Bulls C Joakim Noah says: “I love playing with the guy. He has a lot of confidence, and he doesn’t ever want to let us lose. He is the best closer in the game today. I can’t think of anyone else I would rather have when it is a close game and it’s late and you need to score. He is the best, he is clutch, he is going to find a way. He can miss every shot he takes, but at the end of the game, he is still going to be there and take responsibility and take those big shots when we need him.”
Magic C Dwight Howard says: “I have gotten to know Derrick a lot over the last few years; we did some Adidas commercials together. What has impressed me most about him is that he is so young but he still came in there this year and said, ‘This is going to be my team, these guys are going to listen to me, I am going to be the leader here.’ He is a quiet guy by nature; he is not a big rah-rah type of guy. So he had to kind of force himself into that role, but look at what he’s done. He’s been real good with it. That’s not an easy thing to do.”
Hornets PG Chris Paul says: “He is only going to get better, but when you are starting with the raw talent he has, it’s pretty amazing, where he is right now and where he can get as he gets older. He is just so fast and so strong. I wish I had that kind of speed — that’s the kind of thing you can’t teach. But then he has great body control, too. When he gets to the rim, he knows how to make sure he is in a position where he is not just driving to the rim with his head down — he knows where his teammates are, where the defense is and what he needs to do to either score or make the right pass.”
More awards:
Rookie of the Year: Griffin
Top coach: Thibodeau
Executive of year: Riley
Source: Sporting News
Photos: Jacek Urbanczyk/Polish News