Derrick Rose has been the alpha dog during his days with the Chicago Bulls, but now as a member of the New York Knicks, he knows the team still belongs to Carmelo Anthony.
Speaking to Mark Berman of the New York Post, the recently acquired Knickerbocker said he’s willing to take a backseat in favor of his fellow superstar.
“My job is to come here and help him win,” Rose said of Anthony. This is his team. In practice I’ll push him and be on him when he’s being lazy and vice versa. There’s no bad blood. I’m just here to help him win.”
The former league MVP added that he’d be looking forward to making plays for Anthony and still learning where his new teammate likes to receive the basketball.
“My job is to make (Anthony’s) job easy,” he said. “I’m not coming in for my stats. I don’t care about my stats. As long as we win, I can sleep easy at night.”
Rose was plagued by injuries during his latter years with the Bulls, but still managed to put up 16.4 points, 4.7 assists and 3.4 rebounds while shooting 42.7 percent from the field for the team last year.
The three-time All-star, who’s slowly regaining his explosiveness, believes the way opponents defend him will lead to a lot of open looks for Anthony.
“It should just be easy (for Anthony) with the way I play and how teams guard me,” he explained. “They usually put two guys on me and bigs don’t let me go all the way to the rim. We should have a lot of open knockdown shots and he’s a knockdown shooter.”
Screen Grab from Carmelo Anthony’s wife, Lala on Instagram
Rose even made the effort to strengthen his bond with Anthony during the off-season, by joining him in team-bonding activities in Puerto Rico.
Aside from the addition of Rose, the Knicks will come into the upcoming season with a much-improved roster consisting of Joachim Noah, Brandon Jennings and Courtney Lee.
The team missed the playoffs for the third straight time last year after a 32-50 win-loss campaign. Khristian Ibarrola