by Derrick Rose
Family is important to people in China, and I think that’s one reason why we can relate to one another. They see how me and my family are one. When you go over there, the culture is kind of the same way. Whenever I’m in China, I feel the love. I love going there—I feel that vibe. They made that video for me back in 2017, with all these fans in China saying, “I love you, Rose.” It was pretty amazing. I was emotional. It’s all been a blessing.
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That time with USA Basketball was when a lot of things started to change for me. To tell you the truth, at first I thought all my injuries were just bad luck, bad karma. Until I grew my hair. That was the beginning, and things started to change.
A lot of people don’t understand, but I feel with black people, our hair is everything. Our hair is power, really. That’s one of the reasons that I grew my hair out again. The bad shit I was going through at that time, I began thinking that my mindset was different. It was all about revenge before. I was mad, mad at what they were saying and writing, getting in a corner. That’s not who I was as a person.
After I started growing my hair back, it was like that weight was lifted off me and I could think more clearly. I know it sounds crazy, but it’s real to me. Maybe people won’t believe that, but that’s why I look the way I do now. It’s part of me being in a better place.
You can almost look at the different phases of my career through my hair. First, the short hair D-Rose, kind of like the Samson story from the Bible. I’m not religious, but with black people, our hair grows different—it’s important. We’re able to grow the ’fro. Our hair grows up. A lot of people’s hair, if it gets too long it falls. Ours continues to grow. In other places—tribes—they used to do their hairdos up in different ways for different types of operations, occasions, different powers. The batch of hair I’ve got now, it totally changed me into a different person. Growing my hair out, it felt like I was gaining my strength, but also becoming more mature, more understanding, more considerate. When you’re chasing greatness, it’s kind of hard being right sometimes.
When the hair thing was going on, I began to leave that revenge side behind. When I first came back from my injuries, I wouldn’t say I was in a dark place, but my mindset was trying to prove them wrong instead of just being me. I didn’t know who I was then. It wasn’t me. Now I feel like I know who I am. I know how gifted I am. I know I’m going to do great things again. So why force it? I felt like I was back then—not forcing it, just letting it organically come to me. It seemed to rejuvenate me, where all the old thoughts, I was finally able to step away from a lot of the things that’d been on me. I knew I wanted to keep my hair and I knew things would be lining up right in my life.
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I feel like things are right with me. I just love being a dad. That’s the best thing for me. I always wanted to have kids and have kids early in life. I know in the NBA a lot of guys don’t want kids, they want to have that life. And that’s cool, but it’s not for me. I was always in a household around kids, around infants and babies all the time, having to take care of kids for my mom and brothers and aunts and uncles. I always loved that.
When my brothers were having kids, they wanted their kids to interact with other kids too, which is important. That was my life growing up. Sure, it was tough with not so much space in the house, but you always had someone around to play with, to watch your back, someone you knew cared about you.
It was cool to see my brothers’ kids. Made me feel like, “Damn, we’re missing out.” Feeling like I’m wanting to make our family bigger. I always saw myself having three kids. PJ, he loves kids and he needed a sibling around this time. So I’m glad he’s got his sister, Layla. She’s perfect because she’s funny and she’s just a busybody, always moving around, so it seems like she’s always going to have the same energy.
Mieka Blackman Reese, she’s PJ’s mom. We get along great, great friends. All my stuff is relationships with my friends, me making sure everybody’s on the same page. Look, I have kids with two different women. So it’s on me. I’m the one who has to make sure their relationship is good, which it is. It’s about communicating, having patience, caring. It ain’t like my ex left me. I left her with a kid. So that’s what I have to tell my girl now: “You gotta understand, she’s hurting. I left her. You’ve gotta deal with the emotions and everything.” But we’re good.
PJ lives with her. But when I’m in L.A. in the summer, I’ll rent a house for her just down the street from me and PJ can stay there, stay with me. That was the toughest thing about leaving Chicago. Not being so close to him. But that’s also why New York and Cleveland were good, close, could come in any time.
I met Mieka when I first made it to the league. She’s from Chicago, but when I met her she was a student at Clark in Atlanta. I actually met her in Chicago, but she was going back to school in Atlanta. We dated for a long time. We were together from when I was like 19 or 20 and we didn’t have PJ until I was like 24, 25. After she had PJ, we became more friends. It wasn’t easy, and I was the one leaving. The relationship was stressful for both of us. So we finally agreed to just be friends. In reality, we were friends even before we were in a deep relationship. I really think of her as my friend. Just have a great relationship now. Not a document for custody. Just trust.
My daughter, Layla, was born March 4, 2018. Her mom’s name is Alaina Anderson. I met her through a mutual friend and she’s from Chicago. She’s younger than me, about six years.
Now, PJ was named that because of Pooh Junior, but Alaina gave Layla her name. We agreed that if it was a boy, I would name him, and if it was a girl, she would name her.
Then in 2019, we had my second son, London. I feel blessed.
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I don’t really have relationships with NBA guys, other than on the court. When I get off the court, I live a totally different life, especially now. Sure, when I was younger I used to go to the clubs, but still not with the NBA guys. They’re good guys and I always got along with everyone, but it’s not my kind of life. Always wanted to be with my friends, like Randall, or family. Alaina travels with me a lot now.
I wasn’t sure certain times about still playing. That was true in New York that time, in Cleveland. But I was being selfish. I had money, security—but my money is for the foundation I want to set up when I’m done playing. I’ve done stuff: After School Matters in Chicago, Rose Scholars, funerals I’ve paid for, Murray Park. But I really want to get into some serious stuff—business stuff—after I’m finished playing. It’s always about giving back. I haven’t gotten into it enough yet because I want to when I can be involved full time. Now, it still has to be basketball. But I really want to be able to help kids. Kids are everything with me. I feel life is about giving.
I spend what I spend, but my money is for my kids. I know I want them to be alright. I’m setting up trusts. Also prepping them to be into it, like getting used to handling the money. But I love the fact I can give my son name-brand clothes and he don’t give a crap about it at all. Everybody else, of course, tells him what he’s got. I love the fact he doesn’t care. He’s just a regular kid. I’m just so happy no one will have to worry like we did. That’s what I love about my family. They’re not into the things I’m into. Like I said, I’m actually into materialistic things, even though I don’t show it a lot. They know clothes from me giving them gifts. They’ll say, “That’s nice, but I still want the $25 shirt from, you know, Target.”
What my brother Reggie did was put me in position to have control over my own life. When I was younger, they used to get mad, say your brother seems so controlling. I’ve been this way ever since I was born, same way. Only thing changed? I got smarter. That’s what kills me about it. My brothers know on any position, on anything, I always voice my opinion. I express how I feel, what I want to do. Always did. I try to do it in a respectful way, but it’s me. I always felt that independence. Chicago makes you lea
rn that to survive.
I always believe in and trust in people, but I also can tell about people when I deal with them. My financial advisor, I met her and we clicked right away. She’s more like my auntie now. I trusted her to find me the private banks. I only invest my money in my trust funds—three-year options, five-year options—where you can take some risks but you’re mostly being conservative.
I’ve got a grip on how to do this now, but at first she was making me go to all the financial meetings with the bankers to understand what was going on. I didn’t know about equities, bonds, stuff like that. I studied, I learned, read about it, watched videos, went to three-hour meetings. I’m listening to these people talk. Then I started getting more money, and I’ll admit I got mad about how much taxes I had to pay. That’s how I also got more interested in having life insurance, a will, the different financial instruments you need to be diversified. Figuring out everything so if anything happened to me, I’m gonna have my stuff where it goes directly to my kids.
I’m not making these risky investments, like real estate and stuff I don’t know about—or with people I don’t know. I don’t invest like that. I always felt if I wanted to invest in something—and I will eventually—I want to make Magic Johnson–type deals. His deals can change your life. I don’t just want to make money. I want to make something that’s gonna change people’s lives and affect the community. I’m not doing a lot of that yet. I could easily throw my name on something right now. Or start something. But I don’t want to. That’s why I haven’t started the foundation yet. I want to be able to come in with a suit on and they’re like, “Derrick, here’s your schedule for the day. Here’s what we’re doing today with the kids.” “Alright. Let’s get this taken care of.” I want to be able to be hands-on in there, be involved, see what’s happening and how, be a part of it.
I want to make change. I want to have the facilities to start with—my family able to work there if they want to, everybody’s kids able to go up there. Not exactly a Boys & Girls Club, but something where you have a facility. If you wanna do something for the kids in the neighborhood, you just block off hours for them. So from 9:00–12:00, you have a league going on. Or you have workouts going on. It’s blocked off. From 12:00–1:00, the kids in the area get the gym. So they know at a certain time that this is their court, and you do that like two times a day, where they get to do whatever they want in the gym and experience it that way.
One reason I like to be in L.A. in the summer is to talk to Magic, for him to give me the connection to people who own the buildings, the real estate, for how he goes about what he does. Look at Magic’s involvement with the kids, like the movie theaters. I love movie theaters, and I’ve been to plenty of his.
I feel I always take care of people, because that was the way growing up. You had to look out for others to survive—in our house, in our neighborhood. I always say, “Do it the right way, where I don’t use my money, my savings. I always use the money that I get coming in. Don’t touch what’s there.” I will say, it keeps me humble to see the numbers on those statements. But I do live a simple life.
I’m a simple eater. I don’t eat fish or steak. I only eat turkey and chicken. My mom cooked growing up, she liked to cook. I ate a lot more then, but that’s one of the reasons I think I don’t eat steak anymore. Because when you’re younger, you’re buying steak, but what’s the grade of the steak, the quality? We were buying this steak—or whatever it really was—from the corner store. So you can only imagine how tough it was. I think that’s what threw me off steak, that texture. It wasn’t what you would call a quality steak. On game day, I always ate pasta, ate a sandwich. I was big on Subway sandwiches back in the day, then pasta and chicken or potatoes before a game and I’d be fine. I wouldn’t eat the entire meal. Just half of it. Sometimes go out to eat after a game, but most of the time going back home and me and my friends talking, going over the game.
With Alaina, we go out anywhere to eat on the road. I like Italian food and Chinese food. We go out mostly when we’re in New York, Miami, L.A., Boston, New Orleans, the majority of the big cities, Toronto. I’ll go to movies by myself a lot on the road. Alaina, she doesn’t like scary movies. So I’ll go to a scary movie by myself. I love those kinds of movies. But as far as going to a restaurant, I have to have someone with me. I only like food like that, or I’ll stay in the room if no one is with me. See a movie on the road, go back to the hotel. I never really have to disguise myself. I’m average height, not like 6’6”, 6’8”. I’m able to blend in if I put a hat on. I just look down and walk.
On the road in the league, I love the big environments. Like LeBron playing with the Lakers. Couldn’t wait to play them. It reminds me of the outdoor games back in Chicago, everyone hanging all over the court, the yelling, the taunting. I love the oohs, the ahhs. I love when you make a basketball play and the crowd reaction tells you they understand, that they recognize what’s going on in the game. It could look simple, but, “Oh shit, that was a good pass!” I love playing in places like that.
Like playing in Philly. They’d yell a lot of stuff. There was a guy who had his “Didn’t take the SAT” sign up. You know the guy who would be writing on the board during the games? He was scribbling. He was dying laughing when he showed it to me. I could respect it. I started laughing. I like that kind of stuff. That’s why I always killed them when we played them in Philly. Boston, too. Good shooting arena. Lakers, Staples Center is great. I like Phoenix, Golden State, too.
People would yell stuff sometimes like in Philly and Boston, just, “You’re garbage,” that type of stuff. But I feed off it. “Alright, that’s where we’re at right now? Just watch this now. I’m going to score this next bucket and we’ll see if you look at me the same way.” You gotta feel it. It’s good for the fans, too, to experience that. That’s not me off the floor, but when I’m on the floor I turn into a different person. What do they say in Chicago? Not backing down. On the floor, I don’t have to talk crazy. I don’t have to say anything. I can show you.
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I felt I was building back up, getting right toward the end in Chicago. But you could tell the karma—things were changing. You know when you are with someone and you’re with them all the time, but things are, well, changing, and then someone else comes along? I felt like it was becoming that way with the Bulls with me, with Jimmy coming along. And Jimmy really wanted some things.
I always was cool with Jimmy, no matter what they were saying in the media. I was always cool with all my teammates. That’s what it is having teammates. I never had a problem with Jimmy. No confrontation, no argument or anything. In fact, when Jimmy had his trade stuff come up in Minnesota, he was confiding in me and I was counseling him, understanding what he was going through, how it wasn’t right. We were texting back and forth all the time. I was telling him not to let them take his leverage from him. I was talking to all my teammates then, more than I ever talked with any team. I understood that I was that vet, that I had to be the leader and talk, even though that’s never been who I am.
People always wanted to make it something between me and Jimmy in Chicago, wanting to see us go at it and then step back and say, “Those guys are bad.” Sort of light the match and then, “Let’s watch two black guys fight it out.”
Nah, nothing like that with me and Jimmy. But I will say it was a different Jimmy by the time I got to Minnesota. Not to say he was an asshole with the Bulls, but he was a more confident veteran in Minnesota. The trade stuff and camp, that was different. Remember, I did buy him that watch that time with the Bulls. Just to show, “Bro, I ain’t whatever they may be saying.” It was light love for a teammate. I think it cost like $15,000. When you’re the veteran, sometimes you have to spoil your teammates. I’ve done other things like that. With my family, friends, teammates. Like I said, we like to be generous.
I knew things were changing with the Bulls, but I had to just play. I had a
nother surgery at the end of the 2014 season, but I came back for the playoffs. Beat Milwaukee, though I cost us that one game on defense when Jerryd Bayless got by me for the score after my turnover. We won that series and then it was Bron again, and I thought we had them after my shot in Game 3. Don’t think I called bank. Then Bron makes one in Game 4 and we can’t finish it. But it shouldn’t have mattered. We had that game won, but the refs weren’t watching, or maybe watching and who knows, but they really hurt us. Another loss to Bron. But it does make you wonder.
That Game 3 shot was cool. I did have some reaction after making that shot. Just letting them know we’re still here. You understand, we battled them for numerous years. Even if we had a better regular season, they’d stop us every time in the playoffs. Back and forth. Even when Bron went to Miami, same thing. It was just one of those things where it was like, “Man, we’re still here fighting. This ain’t gonna be a cakewalk.” When you’re playing against a guy like that, a team like that, you’ve got to keep fighting to show that resilience. And then in Game 4, come on, their coach, David Blatt, called timeout when they didn’t have one. Should have been a technical and the game is over. We’re up three games to one.
Hell yeah, I saw it. We knew right away. Thibs always tells you how many timeouts you have, how many they have, if they’re gonna foul, the situation. You know with Thibs he always was the most prepared. Dude is all the way out on the court calling a timeout. Right in front of the ref. Everyone knows.
