Sixteen years after igniting a frenzy of fandom when the Bulls selected him with the No. 1 pick in the NBA draft, Chicago native Derrick Rose is retiring from basketball. Rose leaves a legacy of hope and heartbreak. Two state championships with Simeon. An MVP trophy, Rookie of the Year award and three All-Star selections with the Bulls. Four knee surgeries and a missed season due to ankle injuries. And an endless list of lingering questions — set to the tune of “What if?” But he focused on love in a heartfelt retirement letter he wrote to fans in a full-page ad that appeared in Thursday’s Chicago Tribune. “You believed in me through the highs and lows, my constant when everything else seemed uncertain,” Rose, 35, wrote. “You showed me what love truly meant. You turned the court into my sanctuary, a home where I could express myself freely. You made every morning and late night we spent together worth every drop of sweat. … You taught me that every loss was a lesson and every win was a reason to be grateful. You offered wisdom that was not just about the game, but about life, discipline, hard work, perseverance. … “You stood by me even when the world seemed against me, unconditionally, waiting for me to pick you up. You gave me a gift, our time together, one that I will cherish for the rest of my days. You told me it’s okay to say goodbye, reassuring me that you’ll always be a part of me, no matter where life takes me. “Forever yours, Derrick Rose.” NEW: Former Simeon and Bulls star Derrick Rose is retiring from basketball. The 2011 MVP made the announcement in the Chicago Tribune this morning. "You told me it's okay to say goodbye, reassuring me that you'll always be a part of me, no matter where life takes me." pic.twitter.com/ERTaX98l64 — Julia Poe (@byjuliapoe) September 26, 2024 There was a time when next to nothing in Chicago was as exciting as Rose, who grew up in Englewood. As an eighth-grader throwing down dunks at Beasley Academic Center. As a high school junior drawing capacity crowds at Simeon. As a 22-year-old hoisting the NBA MVP trophy — the youngest in history to do so — at center court at the United Center. In those early years of his career, Rose perpetually defined and redefined what it meant to be a kid from Chicago. There have been others since then. The current Bulls roster is a reflection of Rose’s legacy, filled with young players such as Ayo Dosunmu who grew up watching Rose at the United Center, dreaming they could be next. It was a burden and an honor Rose understood, a mutual love he shared in his MVP acceptance speech as he thanked the Bulls and the city for loving him back. “It feels good going into other arenas and you’ve got half the crowd on your side,” Rose said on May 3, 2011. “It makes you feel good as a player, especially being in this organization. I’m happy that you all picked me and I’m going to try my hardest to play the game like I know how to play it, and that’s hard.” Among those Rose thanked in that speech were his teammates and coaches, ownership and fans — and Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen for building the franchise’s foundation. And, of course, he thanked his mother, Brenda. ”You kept me going. I love you and appreciate you being in my life,” Rose said. So it was fitting Brenda penned a handwritten note to her son that appeared next to his retirement announcement Thursday. “You’ve had a basketball in your hand ever since the age of two,” Brenda Rose wrote. “As a young man from Englewood you fulfilled your dream of entering the NBA. You are now leaving as a mature man with a beautiful family. You have always loved the game of basketball and God has a new plan for you.” Rose averaged a career-high 25 points in that MVP season, leading the Bulls to an NBA-best 62 wins and the No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference. They lost to LeBron James and the Miami Heat in five games in the East finals. Less than a year later, Rose’s career took a sharp turn for the worse. On April 28, 2012, he crumpled to the court in garbage time of a first-round playoff win against the Philadelphia 76ers and the end of everything began. First it was surgery for a torn ACL in his left knee. Then a controversial decision to sit out the 2012-13 season. Then a meniscus tear in his right knee in 2013, followed by the injury in 2015. Rose helped the Bulls reach the playoffs one last time in 2015, but he was only a shell of himself, offering brief glimpses of his former prowess. When the Bulls missed the playoffs in 2016, little was left of the championship-caliber expectations from when Rose was drafted. The Bulls then did what once was deemed unthinkable: On June 22, 2016, they traded the homegrown star to the New York Knicks in a five-player deal. He finished his seven seasons with the Bulls having averaged 19.7 points and 6.2 assists. In 15 NBA seasons, he averaged 17.4 points and 5.2 assists. Rose’s legacy wasn’t untarnished. In August 2021, his college team at Memphis was forced to vacate its record 38-victory season that ended with a run to the Final Four because of the Bulls point guard’s evident role while competing as an academically ineligible player. The NCAA Committee on Infractions’ report did not name a player, but Rose was the only Memphis player to match the description. The player in the report was accused of having another person take his SAT so he would be eligible to play at Memphis. Rose’s relationship with the Bulls front office soured to a point of no return as he insisted on sitting out the 2012-13 season. And in his final season in Chicago, Rose faced allegations of sexual assault from a former girlfriend, of which a federal jury in Los Angeles found not credible. This is the complexity of the footprint that Rose will leave on the league — fleeting, flawed, unfinished. For a few years, Rose captured the imagination and admiration of an entire city. Everything that came after was an incessant attempt to recapture that ineffable stardom that never returned after his first knee injury. For the next eight years, Rose showed flashes of his prior brilliance with less and less consistency. But for one October 2019 night in Minneapolis, Rose found himself again. He splashed 3-pointers from well behind the arc, wove between Utah Jazz defenders to hunt the rim, bounced up from hard fouls with the buoyancy of his younger self. Rose closed out a Timberwolves win by blocking a game-winning attempt by Dante Exum, finishing with a career-high 50 points. Rose cradled his head as he walked off the court, tears flowing. An hour later, he told the media that his hands were still shaking. For Rose, the game felt like proof of something — that he wasn’t done. Not yet. “In every story, there’s a beginning, a middle and an end,” former Bulls and then-Timberwolves coach Tom Thibodeau said after the game. “And I think the end is going to be great for him.” But Rose never found that perfect ending. He bounced from the Detroit Pistons back to the Knicks, sinking deeper and deeper into bench rotations. Rose had grown introspective by the time he returned to the United Center with the Knicks in December 2022. He still felt healthy, still believed he had plenty left to give in his career. But his sightline had begun to shift toward legacy, toward a life after basketball. “In 200, 300 years, nobody is going to care about what went on,” Rose said after the Dec. 17 game. “For me, the knowledge, the wisdom, the love, the capital I got from this sport allowed me to do a lot, and I’m very grateful and appreciative of that. The things I want to do after basketball I feel like are going to be bigger than what I do in basketball.” That game was the last time Rose played on his hometown court. He spent one final season in Memphis, where he provided more veteran leadership off the court than production on it. His announcement Thursday — nine days shy of his 36th birthday — marked an acceptance of an ending that already had begun years ago. Rose may have faded in his final years in the NBA, but his memory won’t. His jersey is forever enshrined in the rafters at Simeon, the blue and yellow No. 25 representing some of the greatest years in the school’s history. Now, another gym on Madison Street awaits its own addition — a No. 1 jersey in a red and white colorway, a reminder of the last Bulls MVP.