Prior to Jeff Hornacek’s arrival in the Big Apple, the Knicks front office was targeting a “lead guard” to help improve the team in the short and long term. New York’s president Phil Jackson expressed his optimism following a five-player trade with the Chicago Bulls that led to the Knicks landing the 2011 MVP, Derrick Rose.
In fact, Mills mentioned the need for a point guard as a first priority on MSG Network’s special with Al Trautwig. “Steve [Mills] and I sat for a while and talked about this. We felt that our group needed some kind of aggressive play, full court aggressive attack and this is one of the ways we could get it done,” Jackson confirmed.