5 reasons New York Knicks shouldn’t trade for Derrick Rose
By John Buhler
1. Rose’s health will always be a concern.
Trading for an often-injured former superstar in Rose is risky in itself. While there are teams with great basketball culture like the San Antonio Spurs and the Boston Celtics that could afford to assume the risk of another season-ending injury coming from Rose should he be on their team, the Knicks aren’t even close to being in that category as an organization.
While gambling on a former MVP to return to form might prove beneficial to a downtrodden Knicks team, it is more likely than not going to have disastrous consequences that will ruin the Knicks for years if he gets hurt again on the hardwood.
The last two seasons in Chicago have been better for Rose since he tore his ACL in the 2012 NBA Playoffs against the Philadelphia 76ers, but he hasn’t returned to even All-Star form. Rose is a serviceable point guard in the NBA, but there are easily 10 point guards that are better than him entering the 2016-17 NBA season.
His injuries have made him this era of the NBA’s version of Penny Hardaway, the former standout point guard for the Orlando Magic in the 1990s. Like Hardaway, Rose was a top three player in the league in his prime. However, once knee injuries derailed their respective careers, they fell back into the middle of the pack of NBA point guards, as their games relied so much on athleticism they just didn’t have any more.
Do the Knicks even know what they would be signing up for if they did make a trade with the Bulls to acquire Rose to be their next starting point guard?
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