How Christian Wood can improve for the Detroit Pistons
The Detroit Pistons found that one of their brightest spots this season came from an unlikely face. How can he improve for them?
Heading into the 2019-2020 NBA season, it wasn’t expected that by the end of the year Christian Wood would be making headlines for the Detroit Pistons.
It ended up being rather bittersweet, as he wound up making more headlines for testing positive for COVID-19. Basketball fans around the world were getting their first introduction to him for the wrong reasons.
Luckily Wood has since recovered from the virus and is in good health.
His performances near the end of the season for Detroit began to slowly put him on the map. After posting new career highs in points in three of his final four games, his scoring talent became undeniable. His potential as a future rim-runner wasn’t in question.
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He spent the first few months of the season receiving inconsistent minutes behind Thon Maker in the second unit. Dwane Casey often cited Wood’s lack of maturity and defensive efforts as to why this was happening.
Eventually, when the trade deadline arrived and the Pistons shipped Andre Drummond to the Cleveland Cavaliers, both Wood and Maker had their first real chance to shine.
Wood seized this opportunity and didn’t look back.
In the 13 games that were played in the post-Drummond era, Wood averaged 22.8 points, 9.9 rebounds and 2.0 assists per game on 56.2 percent shooting, including 40.0 percent from three-point range.
He was also playing 34.2 minutes per game.
Wood was playing with a heightened presence of mind on the floor, making smart decisions with the ball in his hands and was making significant strides as a rim protector.