The Dallas Mavericks are an odd team this season, to say the least. They have won games against some of the best teams in the league while struggling mightily against teams that are toward the bottom of the standings and teams without their stars. Their latest game was against the Denver Nuggets without Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray, a team they had recently beaten, and they managed to lose it in a close-fought encounter.
Luka Doncic has been otherworldly to start the season; he’s put himself in all the MVP conversations. However, he is prone to having bad games from time to time, and the Mavericks struggle when that happens. One of the players that were supposed to take some of the load off of Doncic this season was Christian Wood, who the Mavericks had acquired in an offseason trade.
However, Wood has not been a starter so far despite being one of the most efficient players on the team. He has also not been given too many minutes, and this happened once more in the Nuggets’ loss. The big man had put up 28 points against the same opponents in their recent win, but he was limited to just 17 minutes on Sunday night, leading to some questions and some blunt statements from Wood himself.
Christian Wood Opened Up On His Erratic Playing Time
The Mavericks have high expectations this season, they did go to the Western Conference Finals just last season after all. But their inability to finish teams off and beat bad teams continues to cost them. Christian Wood has been a lot more efficient than a lot of their starters but continues to be relegated to the bench. And it seems he doesn’t quite understand why that is.
A footnote from the Mavs’ bizarre loss to the Nuggets: Christian Wood played a season-low 17 minutes. Wood: “I would love to play more. I’ve voiced that several times, but I just play my role.”
— Tim MacMahon (@espn_macmahon) November 21, 2022
Christian Wood played a season-low 17 minutes. Wood: “I would love to play more. I’ve voiced that several times, but I just play my role.”
Christian Wood is averaging over 16 points per game on nearly 58% shooting from the field and an incredible 43% from three-point range. He is also the only Maverick outside of Doncic and Spencer Dinwiddie that can consistently create offense for himself. His lack of playing time is a real question mark for the team at the moment.
Wood will be a free agent going into this offseason, and if the Mavericks want it to work out, Jason Kidd will have to figure out how to involve him more. Considering that he has all the tools to help the Mavs on their quest to get back to the top, it would be very surprising if his playing time did not go up at all.
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