CHICAGO -- Tom Thibodeau coaches every second of every game as if it were his last. The Chicago Bulls coach expects the same intensity from his players. He believes he knows how to pace a team after spending more than two decades on an NBA sideline. He doesn't believe in resting players unless they are injured -- and as he has said many times over the years, there is a difference between being hurt and being injured. With that in mind, it should come as no surprise the veteran coach bristled before Monday's game when the topic of injuries came up.

"The only way you can guarantee a guy not getting hurt is don't play him," Thibodeau said. "Don't practice him. Don't play him. Don't play him in the preseason. Don't play him in the regular season. Just don't play him. He won't get hurt."

After dealing with Derrick Rose's various injuries over the past three seasons, Thibodeau has empathy for what other coaches are going through with the rash of injuries that has struck the NBA this preseason, but he knows those setbacks are "just part of the game."

"[Kevin] Durant [injured his foot] in practice from what I've read," Thibodeau continued. "[Injuries] happen at different times. So usually, if it's a broken bone, it's probably the result of a collision. It's body-on body contact. It's physical out there."

Thibodeau wasn't done. He referenced the team he has repeatedly called the "gold standard" of the NBA to back up his point about being able to give players more minutes.

"As I said, there's different approaches," he said. "You look at San Antonio, they played late and obviously, they won it. But when I'm looking at their box scores, I watched a little bit of their game, I think it's a strong message what they're saying right now. They're preparing themselves to defend their championship. And so in order to get that away from them, you're going to have to wrestle it away from them. They ain't just going to give it away. And so, I think your mindset has to be right.

"They say [Tim] Duncan never leaves the gym. When you look at great players, that's usually when you read about guys who have achieved something great. It's usually them getting past adversity, them making great effort and their readiness to accept the challenge. I think you need a great commitment from your team if you want to do something special. That commitment has to start at the beginning, and it has to remain throughout."

Thibodeau was noncommittal on whether he has seen that commitment from this Bulls team during the early part of this season, but it's apparent from his recent answers he is frustrated by the medical restrictions being placed on Rose and Bulls center Joakim Noah. Each played 20 minutes, 33 seconds in Monday night's victory over the Denver Nuggets. Noah seems to understand why Thibodeau has been more mercurial than usual.

"He's always pushing buttons, and I think it's a good thing," Noah said after the game. "There's nothing comfortable about what we do, and as soon as you get comfortable, you get your ass kicked, so I think he's just trying to make sure we stay on edge and keep working hard. I think that if we do that he knows that we'll have a shot to do something good, so we just got to keep fighting, keep getting better."

Shaw's theory: Nuggets coach Brian Shaw has an interesting theory of his own on why more players seem to be getting hurt than in the past.

"I still have this premise that it goes back to kind of this generation of player and all the AAU games that they play," Shaw said. "In high school and before high school -- coming up when my generation of players played, and even before me -- you kind of played basketball and when basketball season was over you were done. You went on in and played baseball, and the next season you played football. So you use different muscles. Now, you have club teams and AAU teams and whatever that are playing ball all year round. You don't give those muscles any time off, any time to relax. That's just my own personal theory -- I think that has a lot to do with some of the injuries that we're seeing today."

Rose watch: Rose scored 15 points, grabbed five rebounds and dished out five assists Monday night in his 20:33 of action. Shaw believes Rose is on the right track as he works his way back from another knee injury.

"I saw some of their practices in the summer in Vegas, and it seemed to me as if he had all of his explosiveness back. I know a lot of times you come back from injury [and] the areas that you injured are stronger than they were before when you went out in the first place. But I also think that there's a period where, right away, everything looks good and then you kind of take a step back.

"The timing, just getting the rust out and all those things. But I fully expect for him to return to form. You see bursts of it here or there, and I think that with some of the acquisitions that the Bulls made, especially in particular Pau Gasol, it's going to help make things a little bit easier for him, and he doesn't have to do so much on the floor because Pau will make the game a little bit easier for him and everybody else out there."