Derrick Rose scored fewer points in the NBA than Harrison Barnes and averaged fewer per game than Antoine Walker. Like Brandon Roy, another ascending guard whose career was destroyed by injuries, he made only three All-Star teams.

I was sitting with Derrick Rose at a promotional event downtown and I asked him about his dreams. Not his goals or aspirations — we were nearly four years past his MVP season — but his actual dreams during the dark days that followed his left ACL tear in the first game of the 2012 playoffs and the subsequent right knee meniscus tear that robbed him of his 2013-14 season,