Rodney Hood accepted his one-year, $3.4MM qualifying offer from the Cavaliers earlier this month after a summer that didn’t go as planned. Despite settling for the deal that creates the quickest path to unrestricted free agency, the Duke product says he hopes to parlay the QO into a long-term contract with the Cavs.
“I believe strongly in myself that after this year, I’ll be able to make Cleveland my home and we’ll get a better deal next summer,” Hood tells Joe Vardon of Cleveland.com.
“Just because he signed the qualifying offer, he’s not on the first train out of here,” Hood’s agent Travis King said. “He plans to stay in Cleveland.”
Hood struggled during limited action in the playoffs for the Cavaliers and was relegated to the bench. He also reportedly refused to enter a postseason game against the Raptors during garbage-time minutes. Then, once he hit the restricted free agent market, teams weren’t willing to make a hefty investment in the 25-year-old.
Hood was reportedly seeking a deal with annual values in the $10-12MM range. According to his agent, he only received offers in the $5-8MM range.
“At first I kind of felt bad for myself, but then it was like I don’t want to feel this feeling again, sitting on the bench, or playing 8-10 minutes a game,” Hood said. “I want to be a big part of a really good team, so that was my focus this whole summer.”
The Cavaliers offered Hood a multi-year pact for roughly $7MM per season, a source tells Vardon. Hood told the scribe that he wasn’t “comfortable” accepting that offer from the Cavs. He hopes to sign a more lucrative deal with Cleveland next offseason.
“My twins were born here,” Hood said. “I like the community, even though I haven’t been out there a lot. I want to make this a home. It’s just didn’t happen this summer. That’s how I look at it.”
I respect Hood for trying to take over Game 3 and Game 4 despite all the turmoil at the time. He was doing what we expected Lebron to do which is try and take over the game offensively and he responded pretty well when called upon. He broke outside of Lebron’s system and said screw this and went Mano y Mano with the Warriors#respect.
Lebron did take over a game, the first one. Thing is when you go up against the Warriors thats the most you can do is try and steal a game. GSW were winning in 5 or less no matter what
The Warriors have a lot of shooting but the Rockets showed how they could be beat. Lebron simply refuses to let himself get proper coaching because his stats will suffer. Lebron does play team ball.
Rockets were a much better team. Cavs were pretty weak last year. This Lakers team is easily better
Only thing the Rockets showed is that they woulda loss to the Warriors in 5 games instead of 7 if Iguodala didnt get injured in Game 3. Hilarious how people say Houston would have won Game 7 if Chris Paul had played but wont acknowledge that if Iguodala had played in Games 4 and 5 the series woulda been over then. Lol!
Swish! Iggy missing those games went over most peoples heads, especially NBA analyst who feeds misinformation into the fans mind. Its a pretty story to tell. David almost took down Goliath.
You guys are funny. Iggy’s not even a starter. GSW should be able to win without their 5th best player. Paul is 1st or 2nd Rocket.
The noise GSW fans make about missing their 3rd best player for one game in the 2016 finals is the same silliness.
3 out of 4 titles, why sweat the small stuff? GSW almost got beat in the round of 4. That’s also a fact.
Hood is a bust, absolutely useless, 7MM/year is way overpaid, the ultimate sin a pro athlete can do is refuse to play, that alone disqualifies him from playing in the NBA in my opinion. But apart of that his play in the season & playoffs was garbage. & to top it all up, in Utah they are delighted they got rid of him, not only the team but his teammates… sorry I just cannot see any redeeming feature in this guy, don’t understand why seems to be so many people that likes him.
If Hood was with CLE longer he would have played his yips out before money time started and everyone could notice his slow adjustment. That problem will be solved with a full run-up.
I hope he plays guard, which will keep him involved & around the ball more.
The offseason went well, considering an MVP left. They should be worth watching still.
Yeah I still have the Cavs as a dark horse 8th seed but I’m not sure what the FO will do around the trade deadline. As is they’re arguably as good or better than Miami and Detroit.