NEW YORK — A crowd of excited teenagers sat on bleachers at adidas’s new flagship store in Manhattan and anxiously waited for Knicks players to arrive and raffle off exclusive sneakers. As lines grew out on Fifth Avenue, this group was lucky enough to have front row seats to the day’s events and their excitement was palpable.
The students cheered harder with each arrival until, finally, Derrick Rose and Kristaps Porzingis strolled down steel steps to a deafening welcome. While the reaction is commonplace for a long-time big name like Rose, it’s still new for the Porzingis, who isn’t too far removed from entering the NBA draft as a virtual unknown.