On Feb. 7, John Hollinger wrote a column in the Athletic entitled, “Everything That Didn’t Happen at the Trade Deadline”. The most important, he wrote, was that the Knicks didn’t get Masai Ujiri. The following paraphrases the section on Leon Rose.
There are four teams with agents turned Exces leadership. Rose situation looks more like those of the Suns and Pistons. His team has only RJ as a foundational hope and a bunch of draft choices.Rose must build the organization from the ground up, questioning whether this will include analytics staff. Although they have cap room, it isn’t a banner year for FAs.
Making the reorganization even more difficult will be the presence of “most of the assorted fools and sycophants that have been whispering in Dolan’s ear for the last twenty years,” including Steve Mills.
Another concern is the team’s relationship with CAA, Rose former Agency, that has been seen as working closely with Dolan for the past several years. “League insiders often muttered that CAA was running the Knicks; now it’s a reality.”
John Hollinger’s two decades of NBA experience include seven seasons as the Memphis Grizzlies’ Vice President of Basketball Operations and media stints at ESPN.com and SI.com. A pioneer in basketball analytics, he invented several advanced metrics — most notably, the PER standard. He also authored four editions of “Pro Basketball Forecast.” In 2018 he was honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award at the Sloan Sports Analytics Conference.
Unfortunately, Leon Rose is proving Hollinger correct.