The Knicks had just spotted their better-than-expected start with a home loss to the Miami Heat, but the most pressing issue on February 7 was an impending negotiation. A deal with the Detroit Pistons was about to position Tom Thibodeau of the Knicks to train Derrick Rose for the third time.
The exchange, however, was not yet official, so Thibodeau was not yet ready to discuss the player’s arrival with reporters – not even after his happy spells together in Chicago and Minnesota.
“In terms of escalation, this is a matter for Leon,” said Thibodeau, referring interest in the topic to Leon Rose, the chairman of the Knicks team.
It was a big departure from the defense-loving coach.
Leon Rose, you see, is available to answer questions from the media almost as hard as any NBA executive who runs a front office. Tuesday will be a full year of work for Rose, who has not even given an introductory press conference. In addition to a brief interview with team player Mike Breen on the MSG Network in June 2020, Rose spoke only once with reporters during the team’s Zoom session in July 2020 to formally announce the hiring of Thibodeau.
A public sense of Rose’s vision of how to build a team, how he plans to bring the Knicks back to prominence for the first time since the 1990s, remains unclear.
Our request that Rose break this policy for this article was predictably declined by a team spokesperson – even though Rose’s regime, presiding over one of the surprise teams in the first half of the league, has some good things to boast about. Few predicted that these Knicks would fight for a spot in the postseason, but the present is going well enough that Rose has faced little pressure to expose her moves or her future plans.
“I see orange and blue skies again,” said filmmaker Spike Lee, known as one of the Knicks’ biggest fans, in a telephone interview. “I am very, very encouraged.”
Maybe this is what it should be. On March 2, 2020, Rose participated in her first game in her new role, but the Knicks’ victory over Houston – in their 61st of 66 games in a season interrupted by the coronavirus – was overshadowed by a complicated dispute between the team owner , James L Dolan and Lee on the entrance he used at Madison Square Garden. In March this year: Julius Randle’s breakout season earned him a spot in next Sunday’s All-Star Game; Thibodeau’s guttural schemes and exhortations led the Knicks to the league’s third defense; and tangible positivity is bubbling over the possibility that the team will only secure its fifth playoff spot during Dolan’s 20 seasons in charge.
It also helps that, after seven consecutive seasons without qualifiers, Rose has presided over more hits than mistakes so far. This starts with hiring Thibodeau, whose demanding style worked more perfectly than expected with an inexperienced list. The Knicks entered Sunday’s game in Detroit at 17-17, which was good enough not only for a slice of fourth place in the Eastern Conference, but also to deflect Dolan’s focus, the terrible headlines from last season about his clash with Lee and the much-hired Steve Stoute as a branding consultant.
“Knick fans, we are optimistic,” said Lee. “We see hope. We haven’t seen that in a while. “
Within the NBA, most observers say it would be unfair to rate Rose in one year of work, even if the Knicks (with 13 of their 17 wins against teams below 0.500) were not capitalizing on the famous indulgent nature of the East. Rose’s detractors, or skeptical of his ability to successfully transition from being a player agent at the Creative Artists Agency to a team builder with no front-office experience, certainly see that he deserves more time to shape the list.
The desire to say that the Knicks made a mistake in November when summoning Obi Toppin in 8th place instead of taking electric guard Tyrese Haliburton, who was in 12th place for Sacramento, is tempered by the possibility that Rose also discovered a real sleeper when acquiring rights to general choice 25, Immanuel Quickley, who (sorry, I can’t resist) quickly established himself as a fan favorite. The Knicks made a great effort to hire Gordon Hayward – at the request of Thibodeau – but received applause when they did not overreact after Hayward chose Charlotte. Instead, Rose maintained the financial flexibility to act as a free agent this summer.
Although this class of free agent is not as inviting as previously thought, after several stars signed contract extensions before this season, vibrations of hope are circulating unexpectedly ahead of schedule. New York’s Thibodeau team has a record for established teams like Toronto, Miami and Boston, despite the plays of RJ Barrett, the Knicks’ top pick of 2019, and a broken hand sustained by Mitchell Robinson athletic center.
The exchange for Derrick Rose initially inspired fears that Quickley’s development might suffer, in addition to Toppin’s slow start and the apparent gaffes of previous regimes, which burned Kevin Knox’s first 10 choices (two points ahead of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander Oklahoma City) and Frank Ntilikina (five places ahead of Donovan Mitchell of Utah and six ahead of Bam Adebayo of Miami). Still, Derrick Rose, in his second stint as Knick, has established himself well to strengthen a squad that lacks moves and perimeter pitches. Some of the laughter that would normally welcome Thibodeau’s reunion with Rose, his first choice in Chicago, was drowned out by what Thibodeau is persuading from a group that finished 23rd in defensive efficiency last season.
“Like all the great teams at Knick, they are playing defense,” said Lee.
However, it is suspected that the sunny outlook, even among the Knicks’ longtime loyalists, is fleeting – especially with the Nets apparently collecting superstars for the sport on New York’s East River.
Rose, who The New York Times reported in November earns about $ 8 million annually, and her principal advisor, William Wesley, known as Worldwide Wes, will be judged on how quickly they can deliver at least one player on the talent code ZIP Nets’ Kevin Durant, James Harden and Kyrie Irving. If the Nets play to their potential and emerge as true contenders for the title, following Rose’s current methodical approach, as sensible as it may seem, will require discipline for which the Knicks are not exactly known.
The media strategy, meanwhile, seems to be to let flashes of progress on the court (and Thibodeau) speak. Rose and Wesley are used to operating this way after maintaining very low profiles during their CAA days, but in fact this takes the franchise back, in some ways, to pre-Dolan times. Pat Riley and then Jeff Van Gundy were the leaders as coaches, largely because of Patrick Ewing’s aversion to the spotlight.
When Toppin became the first choice of the draft for this new era, Rose limited the sharing of her thought process behind the selection to a written statement that said little more than “Obi was someone we really coveted”. When the Knicks were criticized for their apparent passion for players represented by former CAA or Kentucky students who played for John Calipari, who is close to Rose and Wesley, it was up to Thibodeau to insist that it is “more coincidence” than the media. suggests.
In a letter to season ticket holders a year ago, Rose wrote: “Nothing about this is easy or fast, so I ask for your continued patience. What I promise in return is that I will be honest and to the point. The reality, of course, is that openness has never been a trademark of Dolan’s property, but who’s going to complain besides sports journalists when the Knicks are playing like brave overachievers?
If this is really the beginning of something – if Rose has staying power after all the false dawns that brought down alleged saviors on the court (Amare Stoudemire, Carmelo Anthony and Kristaps Porzingis) and out (Donnie Walsh, Mike D’Antoni and Phil Jackson ) – only scribes will remember Rose’s letter from when he arrived in Gotham.
Lee also insisted that fans understand why they were rarely informed.
“You know where this is coming from,” said Lee. “This is a top decree. I’m not happy about that, but someone else is playing the cards. We are used to that already. And he is not selling the team, so what are we going to do? “
“Orange and blue skies,” added Lee with a laugh.