Following the Chicago Bulls has become exhausting the past few years. The drama surrounding the Bulls has been never-ending, and the man at the center of it all has been, of course, Derrick Rose. 

The Derrick Rose Saga took another twist in his latest return to the lineup from injury earlier this week. After sitting four games due to a strained hamstring, Rose came back against the Utah Jazz on Monday night.

The Bulls star played relatively well, scoring 18 points on 5-of-10 shooting in just under 25 minutes of action. 

However, Rose didn't exactly look like his usual self, settling mostly for jumpers and not showing much interest in attacking the rim. He also wasn't moving all that well on the defensive end, and he played less than half the fourth quarter in a close game. 

After the Bulls pulled out a 97-95 win, head coach Tom Thibodeau was asked about Rose and whether he looked fatigued late in the game. Thibodeau bristled at the question and repeatedly expressed the need for Rose to play as much as possible in order to get his rhythm back, according to ESPN Chicago's Nick Friedell: 

"Oh, I don't know. Jesus. He's got to get out there and play," Thibodeau said. "I thought he did a lot of good things. You could see he's not real comfortable with the ball yet, but that will come. When Derrick strings some games together, he's going to take off. He's got to go. That's the bottom line. He's got to go."

Later in the press conference, Thibodeau expressed his hope that Rose would be able to play the next night in Denver. 

To some, these comments were Thibodeau challenging Rose to get out there and play even if he's not fully 100 percent. To me, this was Thibodeau's frustration with the entire Rose situation boiling over. The Bulls headmaster has been going through this for four seasons now, and it has to be miserable for a coach to rarely have his best player at his disposal while also dealing with the constant questions surrounding that player's health status. 

Then things got really weird in Denver. 

Rose started the game, but he was all out of sorts against the speedy Ty Lawson. After going 1-of-4 from the field for just two points in 10 minutes of play, Rose was pulled from the game and mysteriously never returned from the locker room when the team came back out for the second half. 

The Bulls soon announced that Rose had experienced tightness in his previously injured hamstring and wouldn't return. My immediate thought was "here we go again," and those thoughts quickly turned into sadness and dismay that Rose once again couldn't stay on the court for more than a game or two at a time. The Bulls were seemingly doing everything they could to keep him healthy, and it still wasn't working. 

But when it came time to meet the media after a 114-109 defeat, Thibodeau painted a different picture, according to Friedell: 

"They'll re-examine him but there was really nothing that happened other than I didn't want to take any chances with him," Thibodeau said. "The way the game was going, the way we were going, I just felt at that point I wanted to go a different way. He didn't re-injure himself or anything like that."

Rose himself confirmed that there was no re-injury: 

"It wasn't nothing like I'm limping or I pulled it or anything, it wasn't any of that," Rose said. "It was just that I wasn't moving the way I wanted to while I was on the floor. So why push through it when I wasn't able to affect the game the way I wanted to? I came in here and talked to (Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau) and we both agreed on just sitting out."

The fact that Thibodeau decided to sit out Rose for precautionary reasons a day after hammering home the "he's got to go" mantra makes this situation all the more bizarre. Was this more of a benching than a play-it-safe move? Did Thibodeau feel bad for possibly pushing Rose to play in a tough back-to-back in Denver? And why did Rose never come back to the bench after halftime? We may never know some of the answers to these questions, but it was all just a bit odd. 

What this latest drama highlights could be a fundamental question about Rose's health status moving forward. What exactly is the threshold between being injured and just being sore or fatigued?

Nobody should want Rose to play injured, especially this early in the season. That's just silly macho nonsense that won't do anybody good and would increase the risk for another serious injury. There's still so much time left in this season, so preaching patience and stressing the long game is perfectly fine at the moment. While I raised my eyebrows at the fact that Rose was pulled with no re-injury, I was ultimately fine with it considering his poor showing and the difficult back-to-back situation. 

But at some point, Rose will likely have to play through some of this soreness and fatigue, even if it means not being at his absolute best. Although he'll have to be at his best if the Bulls are going to reach their peak level. 

Until that happens, the ranks of the mob questioning Rose's desire will continue to swell. He sure didn't help himself when he said he was thinking about life after basketball when sitting out games now, and when people hear him talking about not playing because he's fatigued or not playing like he would like, those comments will immediately pop into their mind. 

I feel like it's absurd to question Rose's desire, as we've heard and seen just how much he cares about the game of basketball. It's his whole life and he has worked so hard over these past few years to rehab from his litany of injuries. 

What I do think is fair to question is Rose's mental state. It's natural to have mental hurdles when coming back from injuries, and it appears he's struggling to overcome them. When he talks about dealing with soreness and fatigue, you have to wonder if he's worried about overcompensating and suffering another major injury. After all, he tore his meniscus shortly after dealing with a strained hamstring last season. 

I hate to say that Rose has played scared the last few games, but there was some evidence of it. From all the jumpers to the lack of drives to the rim to the lack of aggression on defense, he just didn't seem like himself. Furthermore, on the play against the Nuggets where it looked like he possibly may have tweaked the hamstring again, he appeared to look down in order to make a conscious effort to land perfectly after jumping up for a loose ball. That's a guy worried about another injury. 

With all this in mind, what should be the Bulls' course of action? Should they just shut him down for a month and allow him to get back to 110 percent? Should they not play him on back-to-backs for a while? 

If Rose truly didn't re-injure himself in Denver, I'm not sure what good shutting him down for a long period of time does. To quote Thibodeau again, "he's got to go." That doesn't mean playing injured, it means playing through some of the aches and pains so he can get over those mental hurdles and find his own rhythm and a comfort level with his teammates. 

Limiting Rose on back-to-backs would be a smart move, as he clearly wasn't ready for it this time around. Perhaps it was foolish to expect him to be able to handle it with the travel and the high altitude in Denver, but I'm not going to blame anybody for wanting to give it a try. 

There might not be any good answer here, which is a shame considering the Bulls' championship potential with a healthy Rose. The team has looked mostly great with him on the floor, and with Jimmy Butler turning into a star before our very eyes, a healthy Rose and Butler would threaten Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson for the title of the best backcourt in the NBA. 

For now, all we can do is be patient. It's hard to tell people to do that considering we've been dealing with Rose's injury problems for four straight years now, but it's really the only option because he's not going anywhere. We just have to hope he gets out of this funk and puts all this drama behind him by staying on the court and playing great basketball.