Charlotte Hornets Should Have Retained Christian Wood
The Charlotte Hornets move to decline Christian Wood‘s player-option for next season may have been the wrong decision in the long run.
Christian Wood won’t be on the Charlotte Hornets‘ roster next year. He was owed $1.4 million next season but the front office decided to decline his team option instead of keeping him around. With his upside and team-friendly contract, they might have been better off holding onto him rather than cutting ties with the 21-year old.
He was one of their only prospects. Wood was the youngest player on Charlotte’s roster and one of only three players who’s under the age of 24 along with Treveon Graham, Johnny O’Bryant and Micheal Kidd-Gilchrist. By cutting Christian, the Hornets not only gave up on their project but they may have done so too early.
At his young age, Wood could still be a valuable player down the road. He has plenty of room to grow and his upside is why the team was interested in the first place. Instead, they chose to keep O’Bryant who is two years older and with less potential. Even though the Hornets only had five days after the final regular season game to accept or decline Christian’s team option, they should have taken the small risk of holding onto him. Worst case scenario, they have a young big man on a cheap contract who probably wouldn’t play much anyways. Best case scenario, they have a young big man on a team friendly deal who could develop into a quality role player.
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During his lone season with the Hornets, the 6’11 big man averaged 2.7 points per game, 2.2 rebounds per game and 0.5 blocks per game. He appeared in 13 games for the team while averaging 8.2 minutes per game. He shot 52.2% from the field and 73.3% from the free throw line. He has the ability to shoot from three but failed to make one in five attempts this year.
While he didn’t get a lot of opportunities to showcase his skillset with Charlotte, Wood was very productive with their D-League affiliate in Greensboro. In 18 games with Swarm, Christian averaged 19.6 points per game, 10.1 rebounds per game and 2.6 blocks per game. His shooting splits were 50.6% FG/ 23.5% 3P/ 72.5% FT. In 18 appearances, he recorded eight double-doubles.
It was clear from this season that Wood wasn’t quite ready for consistent NBA minutes. Although, he was dominating while in the D-League so his struggles came down to a lack of experience. If the Hornets would have been more patient with him, they could have molded him into a serviceable backup in a few years.
His performances in the D-League alone should have been enough for Charlotte to hold onto him. Instead, some other team will now have the chance to develop Wood and possibly reap the rewards that the Hornets could have enjoyed.
Even though Christian didn’t quite produce the way most were hoping in his first season with the team, he did enough to earn a roster spot.
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The former undrafted UNLV product will now be an unrestricted free agent this summer free to sign with any team. There is a strong possibility that Wood could end up in the D-League next year but even then, he will get consistent playing time and have the opportunity to earn a call-up. As for the Charlotte Hornets, we’ll see if they made the right call on Christian in the long run but in my opinion, they should’ve given him one more year to prove himself.