Utah Jazz: Rodney Hood Slowly Becoming A Star In Salt Lake City

Rodney Hood has been playing out of his mind recently. Here’s why the Utah Jazz shooting guard is on his way to becoming a star.

If you don’t put in the work on the court, then you’ll know it at the beginning of next season.

For true hoop heads, one of the best parts about watching basketball is seeing the progression of players from each season to the next. It’s during that time of development when you notice what a player specifically is good at and you get to see the way they’ve cleaned up their flaws as a player.

If you don’t see a progression then the chances are the player hasn’t worked or developed that part of his game. For instance, we’ve been waiting years for Rajon Rondo to develop a solid jump shot. Meanwhile, the progression and development of an individual’s game is the reason why Russell Westbrook, Stephen Curry, and John Wall all became respective All-Star caliber players during their career, and arguably the three best point guards in the league.

One of the players that plays for the Utah Jazz that wants to follow in their footsteps is Rodney Hood. This year, the 23-year-old sophomore shooting guard is having the best year of his life.

Way Up I Feel Blessed

Firstly, Hood and his fiance Richa Jackson just welcomed their baby boy into the world, so that’s always a blessing. In regards to the court, Hood himself has been a blessing to the Jazz organization.

With all of the injuries that have taken place in Salt Lake City, the team needed someone to step up in the absence of Derrick Favors, Alec Burks and Rudy Gobert, and Hood was the person who did.

If you need any evidence of Hood’s development as a player then look no further than the game he had against the Memphis Grizzlies. In one of the few nationally televised games that Utah plays in, Hood had the best game of his young professional NBA career. He was aggressive and had the dominant ball handler type of personality and a result of that was a monster 32 point game including a win against a tough future playoff opponent.

After the Memphis game, the Houston Rockets came into town.

Knowing that Utah was hampered with big injuries and knowing that Hood and Gordon Hayward were the only two offensive threats in the starting lineup, it still didn’t work to Houston’s advantage. Houston ended up winning the contest by a narrow margin of 93-91, but Hood dropped 23 points and had a career-high seven assists in the game.

The most telling portion of that game isn’t even listed in the stat sheet. What was great to see was the trust that Hood had earned over the course of the year. When Utah was down late in the shot clock and needed a bailout shot, they weren’t looking to Hayward.

The Return

Jan. 7, 2016.

That day marked the date when Utah finally got Rudy Gobert back from injury. Getting someone as talented as Gobert only helps the players on the team including Hood. Since Gobert’s return, Hood has been able to have more creativity offensively and because of Gobert’s presence in the interior he’s scored in double figures every single game.

More impressively, with Gobert clogging the paint, it’s given Hood the adequate spacing he needs as a knockdown shooter. Hood has shot 50 percent or better in three out of his last four games from the three-point line.

Additionally, because Hood’s been scoring at a higher clip without Gobert in the lineup, it’s helped his confidence. Now with Gobert back, Hood’s confidence doesn’t have to falter and it looks like it’s grown stronger. In the month of January alone, Hood has been impressive offensively for a team that desperately needs to find ways to score.

Hood’s averaged 17 points per game while shooting 46 percent from the floor. Furthermore, in his sophomore season Hood has shown that he’s worked on his game because he’s averaging a career-high in points, rebounds, assists, steals, and blocked shots per game. He’s also managing to shoot the same percentage despite taking more shots.

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Utah’s gotten a gem in their starting lineup because they’ve got Hood there. They only need to fix their offense by getting him the basketball more.