CHICAGO — When DeMar DeRozan talked about the Chicago Bulls, he often talked about love.

It wasn’t always outright. But beneath the jokes, the analysis and even the frustration, that affection was the most consistent undercurrent of DeRozan’s conversations. The trust he built with his teammates. The refusal to let a few hard weeks — or months, or years — shake his belief that he could make something happen here.

Even as re-signing conversations stalled out in the final stretch of last season, DeRozan joked that negotiating with the team was like reasoning with a spouse after a fight: “What do we need to do to work on this, baby? Let’s figure this thing out. You want me. I want you.”

The love never fully ran out. That was clear on the court, where DeRozan was always undeniably, recklessly invested. He played hurt. He played tired. Hell, he probably played too much. Last season, DeRozan led the NBA in playing time at the age of 34. In his three-year stint in Chicago, he played more than 90% of possible games.

It wasn’t enough. Of course not. No amount of buzzer-beater heaves and 30-point games could outweigh the dysfunction and disrepair of the Bulls’ roster construction the past three years. But for three years, DeRozan lifted the Bulls to be more than they were meant to be.

In Chicago, DeRozan got back to being himself.

He had already rebuilt his game in San Antonio, but it took signing in Chicago to truly re-establish himself in the NBA. Over three seasons, DeRozan averaged 25.5 points while shooting 49.6% from the field. In the process, he earned back-to-back All-Star selections, notched 12 games with 40 or more points and cemented his moniker of “King in the Fourth” as a two-time Clutch Player of the Year runner-up.

There was a moment when it seemed like all of this was going to work out here.

DeRozan’s first winter in Chicago was filled with hope. Despite all the offseason criticism, DeRozan was clicking alongside Zach LaVine, Lonzo Ball and Nikola Vučević. And there was nothing DeRozan loved more than proving doubters wrong.

And then 2022 came. On Dec. 31, 2021, DeRozan launched off one leg as the clock ran down in Indianapolis, slinging a 3-pointer to close the year with a win over the Pacers. The next night, DeRozan repeated the feat, tossing in his signature pump fake before landing a dagger three from the corner in Washington D.C. to beat the Wizards.

No player had ever made buzzer-beater game-winners from behind the arc on consecutive nights. It was another slice of history for DeRozan, another highlight that belied the weaknesses that would soon send the Bulls tumbling from their stature atop the Eastern Conference.

The impossibility of that shot in Indiana — one leg up, the shot clock forgotten — captured everything that worked about DeRozan with the Bulls. But it’s the image that came after that that fully crystallized the hopefulness of the moment — DeRozan with his fists in the air, teammates hanging off his shoulders and dragging him to the ground, the clock run down to zero with the Bulls ahead by two.

After Coby White missed his own potential game-winning buzzer-beater in February, DeRozan didn’t hesitate to teach. He instructed a trainer to grab a laptop and pull up the film of the final play. With his jersey still on and ice half-wrapped to his hip and knee, DeRozan stood barefoot in the center of the locker room, leaning over White’s shoulder as they clicked frame by frame through the play.

It could be better, DeRozan encouraged White. It would be better. But draw up 100 versions of the same play and DeRozan would put the ball in White’s hands every time.

This is the aspect of DeRozan that the Bulls will struggle the most to replicate. They can find another leading scorer and put the ball in another set of hands in the fourth quarter. But DeRozan was the heart and the rudder of this team for three years.

The hardest part of a team getting younger is the loss of experienced gravitas. DeRozan wasn’t a huge talker, but he didn’t need to say much. He set a standard through action. This was a shared trait with Alex Caruso, whose departure to Oklahoma City will similarly gut the locker room of a much-needed veteran voice.

These are the traces that DeRozan will leave on this young roster. The confidence he imbued into White as a leader. The persistence he honed for rookies like Dalen Terry. On the court, DeRozan was best known for his deadly midrange jumpers and fourth-quarter heroism. But within the locker room, DeRozan made a name for himself with his Bulls teammates by just showing up.

He drove hours to Champaign to see Ayo Dosunmu’s jersey retired by Illinois in the guard’s rookie year. He invited – or more accurately, compelled – every player under 23 to spend summers in Los Angeles training with him. When asked about those workouts the following preseason, DeRozan only grinned, relishing memories of putting the kids through hell.

“The word ‘leadership’ is thrown around so much in the NBA,” Vučević told the Chicago Tribune after DeRozan’s All-Star selection in 2023. “It’s not something you can decide to be. You have to have it within yourself. DeMar has earned our respect — with the way he’s played, with his achievements, the way he comports himself on the court, off the court. He really took the time to make sure he knew everybody and established himself as somebody we could trust.”

Three days into 2022, DeRozan couldn’t go home.

It was an off night. The Bulls had beaten the Orlando Magic. DeRozan dropped 29 points, but he also went 7 for 13 from the free-throw line. Any hint of inaccuracy from the penalty stripe for DeRozan — a now-career 84.1% free throw shooter — was a sign of weakness he didn’t care to repeat.

So he stayed. United Center workers began to strip the opposing stanchion, break down the sideline seating and peel up the court to reveal the ice concealed under the hardwood for an upcoming Blackhawks game. And DeRozan stayed until he made 250 shots from the stripe. Until he made things right.

DeRozan never had the chance to make things right in Chicago. His departure to the Sacramento Kings reflected a harsher truth: there probably never was a chance. The Bulls were too broken, the roster too flawed. It was never going to work out.

But the love was there. That was never in doubt. And as the Bulls take their next steps, the impact of DeRozan’s devotion to his team will remain — on the court and in the locker room, and within this young generation he shaped.

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