DeMar DeRozan cements his status among the NBA elite with his 6th All-Star Game: ‘If you really like basketball, you love his game’

Throughout the 14 years of his NBA career, DeMar DeRozan always has been a player’s player.

That held true in voting for DeRozan’s sixth All-Star selection this season. The Bulls forward was ranked sixth by fans and 10th by media — but finished fourth in the player vote for Eastern Conference front court. Once the final round of voting was passed off to coaches, it was a clear slam dunk for DeRozan to earn his sixth All-Star selection.

This disparity in status might bother some players, but not DeRozan. He has earned all he ever wanted since he joined the NBA: the unyielding admiration of his competitors.

“The respect level of it is beyond everything,” DeRozan, 33, said. “Since I came into the league, I always just wanted to be respected and understood before anything.”

Still, the gap between DeRozan’s perception by his peers and regular viewers of the game begs the question: What are players and coaches seeing that everyone else might miss?

The answer is somewhat obvious in the archetype of DeRozan’s game. It isn’t flashy, lacking the 30-foot 3-pointers or one-handed acrobatic dunks that fill NBA highlight reels. But that doesn’t mean anything to DeRozan’s fellow NBA players, who relish the beauty in his simplicity.

“We just love what he brings to the game,” Los Angeles Clippers All-Star Paul George said.

For the third time in four seasons, DeRozan leads the league in midrange attempts — taking more than 200 shots from the midrange than any other player and shooting 47.1% from his comfort zone. And DeRozan remains the most clutch player in the league, going 7-for-18 in shots to take the lead or tie the game in the final minute of either the fourth quarter or overtime this season.

DeRozan isn’t just a leader in the midrange, he’s a template for success. Memphis Grizzlies center/forward Jaren Jackson Jr. is learning DeRozan’s sweep-through move in an attempt to build more space for his shots.

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In studying DeRozan’s game, Jackson said he grew to appreciate the forward’s ability to take his time approaching each play.

“He’s very patient,” Jackson said. “He reads the game. If you really like basketball, you love his game.”

This methodical style of play likely factors into the lack of respect for DeRozan’s game from the more casual modern viewer.

Besides the 2017-18 season, DeRozan never has averaged more than two 3-point attempts per game. Now it’s rare to see him take more than one per night. And in his 14th season, DeRozan doesn’t get up for as many nasty dunks as he used to throw down in his years with the Toronto Raptors and San Antonio Spurs.

“He don’t want to dunk anymore because he’s getting old,” Jackson joked.

DeRozan’s peers acknowledge his style plays a part in the way he’s perceived by casual viewers. But that style is also why they revere DeRozan — and why they would never want him to change.

“The way he plays the game, it’s a lot of midrange, a lot of footwork and he’s elite at it,” Milwaukee Bucks All-Star Jrue Holiday said. “You don’t see anybody else doing that. The closest to him is probably Kobe. The way he plays, how efficient he is and his style of game — it’s like no other.”

While the midrange shot is lethal, perhaps DeRozan’s best move is an illusion: the pump fake.

DeRozan remains one of the most efficient players at drawing fouls — third in the league last season, 11th this season — because of his ability to send opponents flying with a twitch of his head and a flinch of his hands.

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The signature move fulfills the timeless science-fiction adage from Arthur C. Clarke: Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. And the true magic of the pump fake is that everyone knows it’s coming — yet it still works.

Detroit Pistons coach Dwane Casey used to play a game when he coached DeRozan in Toronto — wait and see which young guy falls for it first. But now the movement haunts him when the Pistons play the Bulls. The opening quarter of the Bulls’ December win over the Pistons was punctuated by Casey’s frantic shouts at his young defenders: “Stay down. Stay down. Stay down.”

“It’s so genuine,” Casey said. “It’s hard not to fall for it. Even older guys do so because he’s so methodical with it. It looks the exact same as his regular jump shot — and he’s perfected it through contact. You can hit him and bump his arm and he’s still going to make a shot.”

At this point in his career, DeRozan relishes drawing a fellow veteran off his feet with the pump fake. Opponents such as Holiday have spent a lifetime attempting to learn how to predict whether DeRozan is baiting or following through on his shot.

But in the end, Holiday said it doesn’t matter whether a defender shows or stays down on a DeRozan midrange shot.

“When it comes down to it, he’s either going to make the shot because he makes it or he’s going to miss it because he misses it,” Holiday said.

Despite the respect for what he can do on the court, DeRozan’s status in the NBA is equally fortified by his presence off the hardwood.

That’s clear even when he’s not suited up, such as Thursday’s loss against the Milwaukee Bucks. Before tipoff, Holiday tackled him at midcourt for a hug, and the rest of the Bucks roster followed, dapping him up, asking about his family, sharing jokes from the last time they saw each other.

“He’s a genuine dude, a straight-up dude, a loyal dude,” George said. “You want to be around a guy like that. He’s authentic. He’s real. You can trust that.”

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That has been clear in DeRozan’s two seasons with the Bulls, where with whom he quickly has established himself as the metronome of the locker room.

Nikola Vučević said DeRozan didn’t force himself into this role. Instead, he put in the work — taking teammates out to dinner, inviting Patrick Williams to train with him in Los Angeles, showing up for Dosunmu’s Illinois jersey retirement, establishing connections between his family and his teammates.

Over time, these simple actions built a foundation for lasting loyalty.

“The word ‘leadership’ is thrown around so much in the NBA,” Vučević said. “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.”