Injured James hopes to make NBA turnaround with Bulls
Standing 7-feet-1 and weighing more than 300 pounds, it's tough to miss Jerome James in person. But he's the forgotten Bull, having been on the shelf with a torn Achilles tendon when acquired from New York last Feb. 19 in the Larry Hughes trade.
James, 33, played in just 4 games the past two seasons with the Knicks and made only a brief stop in Chicago last spring to get checked out by doctors.
He was in uniform at Friday's media event, though, and vowed to play this season.
"I'm about 65 percent," James said. "This (injury), every time I try to speed it up, it slows me down. So I'm sticking to the program the Bulls gave me and hopefully here in a month or two, I'll be ready to play."
Many expected James to simply retire, but he listed his main reason for wanting to come back.
"My kids, they're starting to read stuff on the Internet that just isn't true about me," he said. "A lot of people out there don't know me or have no idea who I am, what I'm about, what I stand for. So I decided, if I'm going to go out, I'm going to go out on top. Get back right, get back healthy and play basketball again."
The highlight of James' NBA career was averaging 12.5 points and 6.8 rebounds in the playoffs for Seattle in 2005. The Knicks signed him to a five-year contract that summer, but he contributed little in New York.
"Unfortunately, it was a bad situation for me in New York," James said. "Clearly, in Seattle it was the real me. I love the game of basketball."
Rose stays low-key: Second-year guard Derrick Rose vowed to work on being louder and talking more on the court. During Friday's interviews, he was still pretty quiet.
"It kind of got boring after a while," he said of his summer. "You do all the business trips and different stuff during the summer. After that, you really find yourself just working out every day. It kind of gets boring when you're not out there playing."
He gave himself a 'C' for last season's rookie of the year performance, because the Bulls didn't get past the first round of the playoffs. Rose also didn't flinch when pressed on whether he took the SAT exam for himself.
"I took it. For sure," he said.
The NCAA invalidated Rose's college entrance test score this summer, forcing Memphis to forfeit all wins from the 2007-08 season when Rose led the Tigers to the NCAA title game.
Deng supports Olympics: Luol Deng considers London his hometown and is hoping to play for the Great Britain team at the 2012 Olympics. He's also rooting for Chicago to get the 2016 Games.
The vote on a 2016 host city will be held Oct. 2 in Copenhagen. The other finalists are Rio de Janeiro, Madrid and Tokyo.
"I really hope it happens," Deng said. "With the Olympics in London in 2012, if it happens in Chicago, it would be unbelievable. It would also be great for people to get to see Chicago. I think Chicago is ready to host it."
The Bulls are headed to London soon for an Oct. 6 preseason game against Utah.