Derrick Rose created an extremely tense situation for the New York Knicks when he no-showed their game against the New Orleans Pelicans Monday night, and the team is said to be furious about it.
According to Adrian Wojnarowski of The Vertical, Knicks officials didn’t even get confirmation that Rose was alive and well until after their blowout loss. Rose ignored phone calls and text messages from the team and his close friends prior to the game, and Knicks staffers were left “livid and embarrassed” by their complete lack of information regarding Rose’s whereabouts.
Wojnarowski adds that the Knicks were already unsure of the type of commitment they wanted to make to Rose in free agency after the season, but the situation from Monday could seal the star point guard’s fate. While the Knicks will likely try to sweep the situation under the rug for the sake of their current season, it’s hard to imagine their relationship with Rose being repaired unless the family situation he was supposedly dealing with turns out to be something very serious.
Further illustrating how clueless the Knicks were about Rose’s reason for missing Monday’s game, Ian Begley of ESPN.com reports that the team had people go to the 28-year-old’s apartment to check on him when no one was able to reach him. Begley adds that the team was “embarrassed” after learning that Rose was healthy and safe.
It’s unclear if the issues Rose is said to be having with his head coach are a factor or if there truly was some sort of family emergency and he was unable to inform anyone about it. Whatever the case, Phil Jackson needs to come out and address the situation before it causes the Knicks’ entire season to implode.
