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NBA Draft: 30 greatest No. 1 overall picks in league history

By Josh Cornelissen

25 Jun 1997: Center Tim Duncan of the San Antonio Spurs speaks with a reporter during the NBA Draft at the Charlotte Coliseum in Charlotte, North Carolina. Mandatory Credit: Craig Jones /Allsport
25 Jun 1997: Center Tim Duncan of the San Antonio Spurs speaks with a reporter during the NBA Draft at the Charlotte Coliseum in Charlotte, North Carolina. Mandatory Credit: Craig Jones /Allsport /
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Derrick Rose
Derrick Rose, Photo by Mike Ehrmann/Getty Images /

NBA Draft: 30 greatest No. 1 overall picks in league history: 23. Derrick Rose

For just over a decade, the best high school players in the country jumped right into the NBA Draft upon graduation, bypassing college altogether. With the NBA changing their rules to require a “gap year” between high school and entering the league, a new generation of players was born: the “one-and-done” basketball prospect.

Derrick Rose was one of the early such players, an elite high school talent who stopped by college for one season. He made that season count, joining a veteran Memphis Tigers squad and boosting them to an NCAA-record 38 wins and a spot in the NCAA title game, a close overtime loss to the Kansas Jayhawks. Rose then declared for the NBA Draft, where he was taken first overall by the Chicago Bulls.

The Bulls as a franchise were still struggling to find an identity in the decade since Michael Jordan retired, and a few years into Rose’s career they found just that. After the young point guard’s second season, the team hired Tom Thibodeau, the architect of the contending Boston Celtics’ vaunted defense. Thibodeau crafted the Bulls’ defense into a lockdown unit and gave Rose the keys to the cars.

What followed was an out-of-nowhere MVP campaign from Rose, leading the Bulls to 62 wins and the top seed in an Eastern Conference that contained those aforementioned Celtics and LeBron James’ Miami Heat. Rose’s 25 points per game and fearless drives to the rim were enough to win him the MVP in one of the more contested races in recent memory.

The following season, disaster struck as Rose’s leg crumpled in the first round of the playoffs and he missed the entire following season with a torn ACL. His career was never the same after that, as his athleticism never came close to its previous levels. Rose has reinvented himself as a crafty combo guard with an outside shot, but can’t sustain the minutes load or make plays for others the way he once did.

No player who has won an MVP award has ever missed the Hall of Fame, but Rose will likely be the first. While he still has gas left in the tank to accrue a few more career statistics, his ledger in the most important categories is likely set: one MVP, three All-Star appearances, one All-NBA nod. The balance of basketball’s highest honor and an injury-riddled career lands Rose here.