Only On The Left Side, Yeah That's The Crip Side

Chicago Bulls point guard Derrick Rose found himself in some more hot water after a photo surfaced on the Internet of the former Memphis guard flashing gang signs at a party during college.  About a week ago, Rose was the subject of violations when his SAT scores were said to be invalid because someone had sat in for him to take the exam.  However, Rose has apologized for the photo and to me, seems contrite.

"Recently a photo has been circulating on the Internet which appears to depict me flashing a gang sign. This photo of me was taken at a party I attended in Memphis, while I was in school there and was meant to be a joke...a bad one, I now admit.  I want to emphatically state, now and forever, that Derrick Rose is anti-gang, anti-drug, and anti-violence. I am not, nor have I ever been, affiliated with any gang and I can't speak loudly enough against gang violence and the things that gangs represent."

"In posing for this picture, I am guilty of being young, naive and of using extremely poor judgement.  I sincerely apologize to all my fans for my mistake. I pride myself on being a good citizen, and role model, that young people can look up to and I want to urge all my young fans to stay away from gangs and gang-related activities."

I have always disliked when the media blows things out of proportion when a photo of an athlete comes out doing something that the rest of society might frown upon.  A couple of examples are the Michael Phelps marijuana photo and when Carmelo Anthony was spotted in his old Baltimore neighborhood hanging around with his old crew and people felt Melo was taking a turn for immaturity and irresponsibility.  Hopefully this Rose thing just dies down because in the grand scheme of things it just is not that big of a deal.  He apologized, seems to be sincere, and most of all loves gummy bears.

Heres the pic...

-Matt Soldano