Derrick Rose was disappointed that the Bulls' season came to a close after a lopsided loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers in Game 6 of the Eastern Conference semifinals last week, but the 26-year-old former MVP seemed surprisingly upbeat given the circumstances. After missing all but one game in the previous three postseasons because of knee injuries, Rose said being on the floor for all 12 of the Bulls' playoff games this year was at least a minor victory. "I got a baseline now," Rose said after the game. "I'm healthy. I'm going into this with a game plan, certain things to work on. I feel like I'm going to push myself the hardest I ever pushed myself in my career and just see where it takes me for the beginning of next year." Rose's optimism is important. The up-and-down nature of his status took a toll on everyone in the organization since he tore the ACL in his left knee in the first game of the 2012 playoffs. The fact that he was able to play in the 2015 postseason at all, after undergoing a meniscectomy on his right knee at the end of February, is something of a silver lining for a Bulls squad that failed to reach its championship goal. In the playoffs, Rose showed flashes of being the type of player who could carry a team, evidenced by his performances in Games 3 and 4 against the Cavs, in which he combined for 61 points, 11 assists and nine rebounds and hit a game-winning banked-in 3-pointer at the buzzer to give the Bulls a 2-1 series lead. There were also games in which he was simply ineffective, evidenced by a Game 5 performance in which he was just 7-for-24 from the field and a Game 6 performance in which he took just four shots in the second half and looked way too passive for a star trying to lead his team back from a 14-point halftime deficit in a closeout game. Much has happened since Rose led the Bulls to the conference finals in 2011, and this postseason underscored how his game has changed over the past four years. In the 16 games Rose played during the 2011 postseason, he averaged 40.6 minutes, 23.5 field goal attempts and 6.3 3-point attempts and shot 24.8 percent from beyond the arc. In 12 games during the 2015 postseason, Rose averaged 37.8 minutes, 19.6 field goal attempts and 5.5 3-point attempts and shot 34.8 percent from beyond the arc. - See more at: http://espn.go.com/blog/chicago/bulls/post/_/id/22150/will-the-derrick-rose-of-old-return
