The New York Knicks are NBA Champions for the first time since 1973. Let that sink in. They outplayed a very talented San Antonio Spurs team, winning the championship in only five games.
And while much of the credit goes to Finals MVP Jalen Brunson, OG Anunoby, and Karl-Anthony Towns, the real MVP very well may be Knicks’ president Leon Rose.
Knicks recent past left fans hopeless
Before the Knicks won the 2026 NBA Championship, it felt like they might never win again. New York had missed the playoffs in 16 of the previous 24 seasons. And they won fewer than 30 games seven times.
But New York’s failures extended beyond the basketball court. The Knicks became the butt of jokes throughout pop culture for their continued pursuit (and failure to land) star free agents, as well as the negative news they generated under former team presidents Isaiah Thomas and Phil Jackson.
That all changed under the leadership of Rose.
Knicks front office maneuvered way out of NBA purgatory
Rose was officially named team president just a few days before COVID shut down the United States in 2020. He inherited a team whose only notable assets were RJ Barrett, Julius Randle, and Mitchell Robinson. The Knicks went a lowly 21-45 in the 2019-20 season, a season for which Rose can not be blamed—but one he had to build on.
Despite never working in a front office, it took Rose only six years to convert the Knicks from a laughingstock. And moves were made each season to achieve that goal. Rose’s first moves were signing Tom Thibodeau as head coach and drafting Obi Toppin and Immanuel Quickly.
Interestingly, there were high profile point guards available in the 2020 draft, a position at which the Knicks were in desperate need. But New York chose the long game, possibly with early eyes on adding Brunson down the road. That took a little longer.
Brunson was added as a free agent in 2022. The Knicks also signed Isaiah Hartenstein that same offseason.
Rose’s next major move was trading Cam Reddish and a first-round pick to the Portland Trail Blazers for Josh Hart in early 2023. He then continued poaching Brunson’s former Villanova teammates, signing Donte DiVincenzo in July 2023.
Next, Rose traded Barrett and Quickley for Anunoby. And he swapped DiVincenzo and Randle for Towns. Finally, Rose traded away five first-round picks and salary cap filler for Mikal Bridges—a move that was widely criticized at first.
And the cherry on top was firing Thibodeau and replacing him with Mike Brown.
Knicks ascent is tricky to duplicate
In hindsight, Rose’s plan appears well thought out. Plans don’t always play out as hoped—but this one most certainly did.
Still, reading Rose’s maneuvers as a blueprint can be dangerous. The Knicks’ success is as much about character as it is about talent. For example, building around a smaller guard very well may become popular again. But it wouldn’t have worked for New York without Brunson’s mental makeup and maniacal approach. Similarly, Towns’ success could rubber-stamp the idea of building around a shooting big man. However, the Knicks’ shooting big man was uniquely willing to reinvent his game after 11 seasons, refocusing his energy on defense and rebounding.
Long story short, the Knicks’ success was as much about personality, culture, and willingness to sacrifice as it was about archetypes of certain players. If anything can be learned from New York’s climb up the NBA totem pole, it’s that attitude and synergy among like-minded players are as important as raw talent. And Rose clearly saw that long before the rest of the basketball world.
So, kudos to the Knicks’ president for creating a winning plan and sticking to it. And who knows, maybe it pays off again next year, too.
The post How Leon Rose piloted Knicks’ unconventional path from laughingstock to legendary appeared first on ClutchPoints.
