THE CRUCIFIX: Cato: Wood isn't thrilled w/ his role...Will depart in the summer

[Kammrath]

Sure it is.  It just depends on the conversation you are having.  If the conversation is ‘Wood deserves more time because he’s better than the alternatives’, then you’d want to net the “On” against the “Off”.  If the conversation is ‘Wood’s on-court contribution hasn’t been that great lately and the overall season-long impact is skewed positively by two uncompetitive games’, then “On” is all you need.  

Who he’s doing this against actually does matter to the second conversation above.  If his gross on-court performance hasn’t been all that beneficial against subs, do we expect it to improve against starters?  As I said in posts earlier today, I’m all for moving Wood to the starting lineup.  What we are doing currently, as you’ve pointed out, isn’t working.  But, if Kidd simply swaps Wood for Powell, I predict it won’t go well.  We’ll know something about how much Kidd wants this to work by watching to see if other changes accompany the addition of Wood to the starting lineup.

But there are four other players WITH Wood everytime he plays...it is not his fault if the bench players lay an egg when he is in. So on/off is the only truly helpful metric here because it rates him relative to other team options. 

Is the team better off with Wood playing or with him sitting? That is the singular question I want to know the answer to and on/off gives us the closest approximation of that.