3 players to watch in Cavaliers-Pistons game on Tuesday

#2: Christian Wood

Detroit reserve big Christian Wood has been very effective in his minutes this season. He’s made the most of his opportunities with Griffin having his aforementioned injury struggles, and it’s given Detroit a lift.

Wood has played the majority of his minutes in the G-League in his career at this point, but he has shown he could fill it up there for some time.

Playing for the Milwaukee Bucks’ G-League affiliate, the Wisconsin Herd, last season before being waived last season by Milwaukee, the 6-foot-10 Wood put up big-time numbers as displayed by Basketball Reference’s G-League statistics, with 29.3 points, 14.1 rebounds, 2.4 assists, 2.2 blocks and 1.1 steals per game.

Wood is a player that Nance, Love and feasibly Zizic or perhaps Alfonzo McKinnie a bit need to stay locked in on as a low-post option near the restricted area, roller/dump-off threat for Rose, putback man and as a straight-line driver.

The Detroit reserve is putting up 9.0 points on a tremendous 67.9% effective field goal shooting clip, as demonstrated by NBA.com. Wood’s also posted 4.5 rebounds per contest and is second in rebounding percentage on the Pistons, as again noted by NBA.com.

Wood is not a real volume three-point shooter, but he is not a player Cleveland can simply play off of from there, though, and he is hitting 43.5% of his catch-and-shoot triples this season, on a frequency of 23.5% as illustrated by NBA.com’s tracking data.

Again, though, Wood is a player Cleveland needs to be mindful of on the inside, and he’s definitely a big that will regularly make his presence felt above the rim if defenders aren’t physical enough and enable him to gather.

On the defensive end, Wood has been a viable rim protector for Detroit head coach Dwane Casey. Wood’s putting up 1.0 blocks in 14.7 minutes per game, and 2.5 per-36 minutes, according to Basketball Reference.

The Cleveland Cavaliers have struggled to finish near the rim in the 2019-20 season, but Garland, Sexton, Jordan Clarkson and Cedi Osman have been respectable mid-range shooters when bigs have been dropping in pick-and-roll coverage.

I’d look for the Cavs to attack Wood in that way as well if he is dropping, or in switchouts.

Though I would’ve thought based on him reportedly practicing in a full capacity on Sunday for the Cavs, Dylan Windler, a good pull-up shooter, could get some solid matchups at times if Wood’s switched out on to him, as Amico noted, Windler is listed as out against Detroit. Windler could be close to his debut after being out thus far due to his reported stress reaction in his left leg.

Cleveland could attack Wood inside with cross screens involving Tristan Thompson, Nance, Love and/or Zizic, too, though.

Anyhow, Wood is a player that I’ll be looking out for in this first Cavs-Pistons matchup of 2019-20.

For the record, according to NBA.com, Wood has the best net rating among regular rotation players on Detroit this season.

The Cavaliers need to be well-aware of Wood’s presence on both ends, and need to keep him from consistently having a profound impact near the rim.