Rodney Hood: Won't be missed

[wajdi]

I don't think so..

Hood is a terrible defender, Clarkson is.. not good.. Nance is a good defender, but not versatile across the front court and not a rim protector.

Hill was a great defender, but he's not at the moment -- we'll have to see if he can get back to form.

What might improve us defensively is effort and the growth of these players and perhaps a system that can be tailored to their strengths and weaknesses.

Lol so why the hell we did this trade if all these players are bad defenders? Lol we are fucked!

 

[gourimoko]

I think like Hood coming off the bench initially ..

Clarkson
Hood
Korver
Cedi
Nance

Would be an undersized by explosive 2nd unit with 2-3 good shooters and the ability to run teams off the floor...obviously my guess is Bron or Hill ultimately gets alot of PT with this unit

I hear you, bro... but think about this: Hood and Hill already have good chemistry together as a backcourt. So .. I'm not sure why we wouldn't want to exploit that.

 

[cavsfever]

ESPN on their bullshit again. If you listen to Lue's interview today, the actual context was way different than what is portrayed. Yes, he envisions JR as possibly remaining the starter, but that is also because he envisions Hood possibly starting at the 3 while Love is out. He specifically mentioned rolling with Hill, JR, Hood, LBJ, TT as the starters, which is fine.

yes, with Love out this is a reasonable approximation of just going with our best players, except maybe that Green or Nance is better all round than TT but less well suited to play the five.

JR isn't exactly one of our best this very moment, but we could try to get him back to that level, and he should still be a better bet than Clarkson.

 

[Cavatt]

I hear you, bro... but think about this: Hood and Hill already have good chemistry together as a backcourt. So .. I'm not sure why we wouldn't want to exploit that.

Lue is still trying to get JR going. He is showing signs of life. If he and Hood can start awhile, it might be easier to have him move to the bench when Love comes back instead of replacing him with Hood not playing a single minute.

I really like Hood's game. I don't know much about his defense, but his rep is bad. If he is really as bad as even you say, I think I'd rather have JR. I need some time to watch him.

 

[cavsfever]

I don't think so..

Hood is a terrible defender, Clarkson is.. not good.. Nance is a good defender, but not versatile across the front court and not a rim protector.

Hill was a great defender, but he's not at the moment -- we'll have to see if he can get back to form.

What might improve us defensively is effort and the growth of these players and perhaps a system that can be tailored to their strengths and weaknesses.

Is Hood really that bad as a defender, as to be called "terrible"? It always seemed to me that he was mediocre, but not horrible. He gets pushed around in the post but gives effort on the perimeter and his length helps.

Now is the time when it would really help for Lebron to model some good defense. I'd like it if his minutes were reduced to let him do that, I don't think it makes sense for him to give full defensive effort when he is leading the league in minutes per game, in fact I think doing that during the regular season would be a real risk for his playoff performance.

Lebron will never admit that he needs to play fewer minutes, but his loafing on the court screams that this is a necessity.

 

[gourimoko]

Lol so why the hell we did this trade if all these players are bad defenders? Lol we are fucked!

Well, it's undeniable they're bad defenders.. We're lying to ourselves if we say otherwise.

But, the Hill and Hood trades did make a great deal of sense.. Hill was nothing more than a salary dump, and we traded Jae Crowder for Rodney Hood. You could argue we should've targeted Derrick Favors but, as I said in another thread, it didn't seem as though the Cavs wanted to deal with too much uncertainty heading into the draft beyond LeBron James' free agency. With both Nance and Hood being under team control, they only need to worry about James.

But the point of these trades is to hedge on LeBron leaving... IMHO.

If James stays, you have the Nets pick, a showcased Cedi Osman, Hood under a market-favorable deal, Nance under hopefully a decent contract, and Kevin Love. That's a good amount of assets; in fact, it's probably better than what we had yesterday, especially if the Nets can bottom out. So we'll have the assets to make a trade; however, it's risky because we don't even know who might be available. There's only so many players in the league worth the Nets pick and I don't see many, if any, of them being available.

And ultimately, the other aspect of the trade is that, if James leaves; we've got all these contracts expiring in 2019-20; we took on no large deals (see: Batum); we have very little guaranteed salary after next season... We have the Nets pick, and we have young players like Hood, Osman, Zizic, Clarkson, and Nance who, for the most part, should be on movable deals and mostly carry positive value moving forward.

So we've basically kicked the can down the road to the offseason. If this draft goes poorly, or if we can't make a deal work for a superstar; my expectation would be that James would start to consider his options rather carefully. He can do only 1 more 1+1 before the Over-38 rule will start costing him money.

 

[gourimoko]

Is Hood really that bad as a defender, as to be called "terrible"?

Yep... He's really bad.

A lot of it has to do with effort, I think... It's not his physical ability, insomuch as it just not his focus I think.

 

[Triplethreat]

Yep... He's really bad.

A lot of it has to do with effort, I think... It's not his physical ability, insomuch as it just not his focus I think.

Hood and Hill were dam good defensively together in their stint in Utah.

 

[PIP]

I hear you, bro... but think about this: Hood and Hill already have good chemistry together as a backcourt. So .. I'm not sure why we wouldn't want to exploit that.

In theory yes ! I would agree..There’s always quality examples of former players whom meet up on different teams later in their careers to form a seemless transition... Hell, just watch the way Chris Paul works with Trevor Ariza...

However that is usually in the confines of a system that is predicated on ball and player movement...Which to me could eliminate the value of Hill/Hood chemistry..

I’m very intrigued to see how Lue’s hand is forced to actually coach the team?? I believe LeBron can and is willing to slightly conform a bit to provide a better flow offensively..The pressure is truly on him now as the ball dominant players are gone and guys who fit far better into traditional basketball roles/offense are here..

 

[I'mWithDan]

I don't think so..

Hood is a terrible defender, Clarkson is.. not good.. Nance is a good defender, but not versatile across the front court and not a rim protector.

Hill was a great defender, but he's not at the moment -- we'll have to see if he can get back to form.

What might improve us defensively is effort and the growth of these players and perhaps a system that can be tailored to their strengths and weaknesses.

Defense is a mixture of effort and athleticism......so it truly depends on how motivated these guys are. There's no reason Hood, Clarkson and Nance can't be at least above average defenders given their length and athleticism. I also think a switching system plays more to their defensive strengths, vs. just trying to lock down 1-on-1 on an island.

Hill is a larger question mark because physically he may have some limitations. The positive with Hill being he's at least physical enough to carry water on that end, even if he's not the defender he once was. His elite spacing off the ball on offense should make it easier on our other creators to have more pronounced driving lanes as well.

With Hood, I think it is a bit of a perfect storm. They have shuffled their lineup with Gobert being injured twice this year and Hood was playing a lot of minutes out of position or with a collection of players he wouldn't normally be playing with. That's why I think it's a little tougher to assess him defensively THIS year. I'd lean more towards his historical defensive metrics, that aren't earth shattering but at least passable. Hood hovered more in the bottom of the top 1/3rd (30-35th) of the league in SG defensive metrics.

This season, I won't argue, has been a disaster.....but I think a lot has been out of his control. I think he'll be fine as a defender, especially in a switching system where his length with be more of an asset. To me, he's the exact mix / profile you look for in a buy lower guy. If I was a betting man, I'd put money on Hood looking far more like his 2015, 2016 season self on defense (passable), while giving us the offense punch we need at the 2.

 

[godfather]

I don't think so..

Hood is a terrible defender, Clarkson is.. not good.. Nance is a good defender, but not versatile across the front court and not a rim protector.

Hill was a great defender, but he's not at the moment -- we'll have to see if he can get back to form.

What might improve us defensively is effort and the growth of these players and perhaps a system that can be tailored to their strengths and weaknesses.

They're just much better offensively, IMO.

I think we're still at the bottom of the league defensively.

The biggest problem has been that our wing defenders aren't getting it done.

You still have JR, Clarkson, and Hood, all poor perimeter defenders.

And the 5 position has been non-existent.

Sure, losing IT's awful defense will help. Hill is still good, but not a shut down defender.

I think we've barely moved the needle on that end TBH.

If they would have gotten a Deandre Jordan, all pieces would look different.

Basically, given our back end isn't very good, we need shut down perimeter defenders. And we just don't have that.

 

[ChosenOne23]

I don't get the skepticism about Hood's Defense. The Jazz spotted the third best Defense in the league last Season and he was starting for them. Next to defensive juggernauts like Joe Ingles. I mean, sure, they got Rudy Gobert, but he missed quite a few games this season and they still rank as a Top 5 Defense.

The starting Backcourt of a Top 3 Defense last year ( Hill-Hood) is now the starting backcourt of this team. That's not too shabby. Even if we don't have a rim protecting presence like Gobert. A rim protector doesn't cure all problems, guys on the perimeter have to be disciplined as well.

 

[FrontPageNews]

I don't get the skepticism about Hood's Defense. The Jazz spotted the third best Defense in the league last Season and he was starting for them. Next to defensive juggernauts like Joe Ingles. I mean, sure, they got Rudy Gobert, but he missed quite a few games this season and they still rank as a Top 5 Defense.

The starting Backcourt of a Top 3 Defense last year ( Hill-Hood) is now the starting backcourt of this team. That's not too shabby. Even if we don't have a rim protecting presence like Gobert. A rim protector doesn't cure all problems, guys on the perimeter have to be disciplined as well.

The skepticism comes from watching him play. System defenders are always risky once they leave the system. And gobert does cure a lot of problems. He’s that good.

 

[Cavatt]

Read a Jazz article and the guy was psyched they don't have to pay Hood. that is crazy to me. He also thinks that Crowder is going to be their stretch 4. Uh oh.

 

[Jscc]

On the bright side, Rodney Hood may very well be a younger JR Smith. The career stats comparison is uncanny: