The Knicks made headlines late on Tuesday night when it was reported that they would not be extending the contract of general manager Scott Perry. While the immediate speculation was that the Knicks would be going after recent Warriors general manager Bob Myers, who stepped down this weekend, the truth may simply be that the Knicks already have their replacement for Perry.
That person would very likely be current Senior Basketball Advisor Gersson Rosas.
Rosas was hired by the Knicks shortly after he was fired by the Minnesota Timberwolves late in 2021. While Rosas was on the hot seat with new owners coming in, the process of his firing was “sped up the more they learned about the deterioration of his relationship with [Timberwolves’ executive vice president of basketball operations Sachin] Gupta and after evidence was brought to them about a consensual romantic relationship between Rosas and another team employee.”
The relationship in question broke no rules and was entirely consensual, so it seems as though new owners in Minnesota simply wanted to move in another direction.
The 44-year-old Rosas had previously spent 10 years in Houston’s front office and then was named general manager of Dallas in 2013. He was with the Mavericks for just three months before returning to the Rockets and then eventually moving on to Minnesota.
During Rosas’ time in Minnesota, he missed on his pick of Jarrett Culver in 2019 and also orchestrated a trade for guard D’Angelo Russell, a close friend of Karl-Anthony Towns. Yet, those two players were both, and the Wolves finished 23-49, which caused many to criticize Rosas.
However, when the Knicks brought him in just before the 2022 trade deadline, he immediately became a central figure in trade negotiations for the Knicks, even acting as the main negotiator for Knicks in Donovan Mitchell trade talks.
Considering how well it worked out for New York to hold firm and not meet Utah’s demands for Mitchell, which reportedly included combinations of RJ Barrett, Quentin Grimes, Immanuel Quickley, and multiple first-round picks, that could be a feather in Rosas’ cap.
However, the biggest indicator that the Knicks could move forward with Rosas is found in Steve Popper’s article for Newsday which first mentioned that the Knicks would not be extending Scott Perry’s contract again.
Popper added more context for the move by saying Perry was “Extended 2 years ago by the current front office, he helped smooth the transition but won’t be kept on in the crowded group of decision makers.”
The wording here of “smooth the transition” makes it seem as though the Knicks always planned to have Perry be the intermediary to an option they felt was more of a long-term fit. Given that Rosas was hired during this period of transition, connecting the dots to his name does make some sense.
At least, more sense than hoping for Bob Myers, who left Golden State amidst personal questions about his own future, to come to New York. It would be unlikely that Myers’ uncertainty about what he wanted next for his professional future would lead him to agree to take a job that would inevitably force him to be a secondary voice behind Knicks’ owner James Dolan and potentially even head coach Tom Thibodeau.
So, for now, Knicks fans will wait and see which direction the team goes, and Gersson Rosas will wait to find out if he gets yet another chance to be the key decision-maker for an NBA franchise.
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