The front office duo of president Steve Mills and Scott Perry has started to change how decision-making is done in New York, giving the Knicks a complete revamp of mentality. Mills and Perry had to teach a lot of new things, among them is patience — something that is hard to come by with the demands of one of the biggest markets in basketball.
Their greatest venture perhaps was to preach that same concept to Kristaps Porzingis, who was itching for that contract extension, making him wait until 2019 to increase the team's salary cap flexibility, allowing for the signing of Enes Kanter while freeing up roughly $10 million in cap space.
“When Scott came in, we just made a commitment to each other,” Mills said, according to Steve Popper of Newsday. “It’s just what we believed.
“The first thing we had to do was convince players this is a good place to play and that we have a plan, what their role is in the plan, and to make them feel comfortable that we’re doing something the right way, that we’re going in a positive direction and make them feel like part of something important and they’re going to be part of something big. And that was our goal throughout the season, to make these guys believers in us and believers in the Knicks.
“And at the same time convince the players outside of the Knicks that something’s different here and this team is going in the right direction and this is a good place to be.”
Porzingis could now play alongside another top-tier star like Jimmy Butler or Kyrie Irving next season if it all goes right for the Knicks front office, who will look to keep that same patient approach throughout the course of the season, even if it means racking up the losses.
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