A year ago, the NBA was meeting in Chicago for the All-Star weekend and the Knicks, unsurprisingly, were invisible. None of the players came close to being nominated for the game. There was no one in the dunk competition, no one in the 3-point competition.
The only bright light? RJ Barrett played for the World Team in the Rising Stars Challenge and scored 27 points, the best in the game. The other side? His team lost 151-131 to the US team. Another humiliation on the scoreboard in a season full of them for the rookie.
The newspaper offered no comfort. The Knicks had 17-38, the fifth worst record in the league of 30 teams. They had already fired a trainer (David Fizdale), a president (Steve Mills), were just days away from officially handing over the keys to the castle to an agent (Leon Rose) who had never spent a day in the NBA front office.
Jay Wright de Villanova, considered a certain target of Rose, sent a message through intermediaries seeking his opinion on the work: “I’m not interested”.
Marc Berman’s bulletin in The Post was condemning, but also difficult to argue: no Knicks player earned a higher score than C + after the team’s focal point, Marcus Morris, was taken west. Julius Randle received a C, and fans of the Knicks, who had recently booed him vigorously at the Garden, would certainly not argue.
An anonymous quote that, honestly, could have been attributed to any of thousands of different people, appeared on February 17, 2020 and seemed to serve as a farewell to the state of affairs at Penn Plaza: “Dead end, dead end – end of work. “
And now it’s February 17, 2021.
And look, the Knicks have a game with Magic on Wednesday night in Orlando, Florida, with a chance of reaching 0.500, and it suddenly seems like the most important game the Knicks have played since Carmelo Anthony was preparing to hitting one home in Indianapolis, before Roy Hibbert got his hand in the way (mostly because it is, truth be told; and that game happened almost eight years ago).
It was a year that felt like five – and only partly because most of us have been paralyzed since March. For the Knicks, the first year with Rose was as good as anyone could hope for. He brought in his assistant, William Wesley, and started adding to the service team immediately.
He took a long time to hire a coach, but when he did, he made the most universally acclaimed Knicks signing since Pat Riley, 29 years earlier. There is little mystery to what Tom Thibodeau and a first-rate team (notably Kenny Payne) did – lighting fires under the players, raising expectations among tired and defeated fans, demanding effort, demanding defense, demanding real, non-moral victories .
The list is still small, certainly compared to the sports elite, but it works well together, especially in a year when the NBA’s middle class has never been so bloated. Randle, of course, is the foothold, having spent the long off-season committing himself to his game again and then adhering to Thibodeau’s system with the fervor of a religious convert. Barrett is improved. Elfrid Payton too. Mitchell Robinson was flourishing before he broke his hand.
Rose’s additions did not go very well – notably Austin Rivers – but he has more wins than losses. Immanuel Quickley may have been the steal from the draft night (and for now it helps to mitigate the fact that choosing Obi Toppin over Tyrese Halburton seems like a short-lived smell). Nerlens Noel was a defensive revelation, Alec Burks a useful resource. Derrick Rose’s early returns are almost all favorable.
So far so good.
The next step, whatever it is, will be more complicated. Rose was wise to avoid the off-season temptations of Russell Westbrook and Chris Paul, was lucky enough to be kicked out by the Hornets for Gordon Hayward, but there will have to be a next step. There are preliminary rumors about Bradley Beal, from Washington, and Zach LaVine, from Chicago, and it will take a lot of effort to attract them – costing not just loot capital (which is plenty, and which eventually will have to be used to attract a big fish ), but also someone like Barrett too.
That’s when Leon Rose’s work will get really interesting. Barrett became a lightning rod player, mainly because of where he was drafted (third) and who was chosen before him (Zion Williamson and Ja Morant) – which is not fair nor does it reflect the fact that he still has only 20 years old, and has already proven to be a quick learner and eager to be trained. But there will be a cost to take the next leap. There will be no discount.
As Gordon Gekko once said: Rose did well. But he has to keep doing well. For now, .500 is a kind of sacred land for the Knicks, but it won’t be like this forever. Your instincts were good. But they have to remain good. It was a good year. The Knicks are winning some. The fans are embracing the Knicks again. Soon, they will want more.
How do you get more, Leon?