Rose in pursuit of elusive aggressiveness

If Derrick Rose looks like Dr. J circa 1976 in a few weeks, the Bulls will be in trouble.

Rose made a vow to a group of reporters after Wednesday's practice at USC that he wouldn't cut his hair until he gets on track.

The Bulls, of course, would rather see Rose play with aggressiveness than with an Afro.

"I need to change something," Rose said. "There has to be something I'm doing wrong. I know the (right ankle tendon) injury was something. But it's taking too long to get back.

"We're winning, so I don't care anything about my game. But if we weren't winning, I'm playing terrible. I'm not going to the hole like I used to. It seems to me that I'm not that aggressive. But it's going to change (Thursday night against the Lakers)."

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"I just think he has to gain confidence in his ankle," coach Vinny Del Negro said. "He doesn't have that explosion that he had. He's trying to get that back with his conditioning. He's a little tentative right now. He has to keep playing through it, get his therapy and transfer good practices to the game.

"He was set back a lot with missing training camp. He has had to use the regular season games to get his training camp and conditioning in. That was unfortunate timing."

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Rose created these monstrous expectations himself by playing at a consistently high level from the start of last season.

"This has to be the first time in my whole life that I'm not being aggressive," Rose said. "The injury definitely had something to do with it. But I have to fight through it.

"(My friends) are just telling me to go out there and play. They said it seems like I'm not happy out there. I'm definitely happy we're winning. But they said it doesn't seem like me out there."