With the recent news of Derrick Rose returning to the Bulls bench, fans in Chicago are starting to get more and more excited for their young star's inevitable return to the floor. With the playoffs looming, optimism has to be higher if Rose can get healthy for a post season run. I might be getting notorious for raining on parades at this point (Rondo, Rajon), but there are three reasons I would be wary about getting too excited about a potential “upset” or finals appearance.

1) Returns from major surgery are always a huge question mark

This seems like an obvious enough statement, but the stunning recovery by Adrian Peterson seems to have made people forget how serious of a surgery repairing an ACL is. Not even getting into the fact that the Vikings fixed a key issue on their offensive line, Peterson is an anomaly in every sense of the word. Even if guys do get back to full strength, it usually takes quite a bit of time before they mentally have that much trust in the knee, and physically they need more time to shake off the rust of inactivity.

Derrick Rose may or may not be rushed back, but with the season's end quickly approaching, putting him into a physical series with someone like Miami or Boston so soon could do more long term damage. Keeping Rose out until next season might be in the Bulls' best interest.

2) The Competition is stronger

I won't even mince words here; I'm talking 100% about the Miami Heat. LeBron is playing the best ball of his life, the Heat have added deadly shooters... and the last time Rose was fully healthy and the Bulls were 1^st in the conference, a much weaker Heat team still trounced them 4-1. Integrating Rose back into a lineup and hoping to stop a white hot Heat team seems like a lost cause, if they get that far to begin with.

3) Derrick Rose isn't an elite player

Derrick Rose is an elite athlete, but he is not elite on the offensive or defensive end. Derrick is a solid yet unspectacular play maker, lacking the court vision of upper tier guys to produce high amounts of assists, and also isn't the type of caretaker to keep a low amount of turnovers like a Chris Paul. Rose has no impact really, good or bad, on Chicago's stellar D.

Chicago, as a team, wins through elite defense and rebounding, which is why they were able to sustain a high (actually higher in 2011-2012 than the year before when Rose was fully healthy).

Rose's calling card is his scoring, and he's never been dominant in terms of efficiency or volume. His MVP year, which was still his best in retrospect, he was 3^rd in the entire league in shot attempts, while only being 7^th in points per game. His player efficiency rating at his peak 23.5, good for 9^th in the league. He's not nearly the scorer that other upper tier guys are, and there are a few point guards who score less, but do it at such an efficient rate that it's actually more valuable in a team sense.

Long story short, the Chicago Bulls are a team that win when they are dominant on defense, but they are lacking the top end offensive talents to win a championship at this point. Derrick Rose to me, is on the same tier as Russell Westbrook, virtually equal in terms of efficacy. The top end teams like Miami and OKC have at least one player who is substantially better (LeBron and Durant) and another player who is at least on the level of Rose(and in Wade's case, even better.)

Most of this isn't a knock on Rose; I feel like he's a smart enough guy that, if he were in Russell Westbrook's position, we wouldn't see nearly the amount of bad shots that Westbrook takes. The problem is that he's Chicago's 1^st and only option as a creator, and he just isn't on par with other offensive forces in the league like LeBron, Durant, Paul, or arguably, quite a few others.

[UPDATE] Via ESPN:

Derrick Rose's doctor has cleared the Chicago Bulls' star to play, a team source said, but his long-awaited return to the lineup won't occur until he can confidently dunk off his left foot, Rose has told the team.