INDEPENDENCE, Ohio -- Rodney Hood would like to re-introduce himself to Cleveland.

Why? Because he plans on staying here a while.

Hood accepted the Cavs' one-year, $3.4 million qualifying offer on Sept. 9, following a summer of not getting the money he wanted in a contract from either Cleveland or the eight teams he said expressed interest.

All of that followed a disastrous 2018 playoff run for Hood personally, who plummeted from coach Tyronn Lue's starting lineup to out of the rotation all together while the Cavs made it to the Finals -- which probably did damage to Hood's market value.

Hood's gained clarity and muscle mass since (he's added seven pounds of it and now weighs more than 220 lbs). He understands the Cavs' chances to surprise the NBA and hang on as a playoff team without LeBron James hinges in no small part on whether Hood is the player the Cavs thought they traded for on Feb. 8, or the one whose plus-minus was the worst of any player in the playoffs.

So Hood took the Cavs' one-year deal with the full intention of earning a much more lucrative contract from them next summer when he'll be an unrestricted free agent.

"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 told cleveland.com Monday in a wide-ranging interview.

Meet Hood, Cleveland

As a Cavs fan, there are all kinds of things you remember about Hood. Some of them are not flattering. We'll get to those in a minute.

Maybe you didn't know, or had forgotten, that Hood is only 25. He's 6-8 and left handed (OK, you knew that), with career averages of 13 points and three rebounds over four seasons. The Jazz drafted him 23rd overall out of Duke in 2014. He played one season for the Blue Devils, after transferring from Mississippi State following his freshman year.

Hood is the youngest of three children from a basketball-crazy family in Meridian, Miss., a small community on the Alabama border.

Hood's parents (Rick and Vicky) both played college basketball at Mississippi State. His brother Rick Jr. and sister Whitney both played at the University of Tennessee-Chattanooga. Rick Jr. runs an AAU program (ages 10-18) in Mississippi that's funded by Rodney (to the tune of about $160,000 per season).

And of course there's, Hood's wife, Richa Jackson, who played four seasons at Duke, while Hood was there. Like Hood's parents at Mississippi State, Hood and Jackson met on Duke's campus as college hoopsters.

Hood's father is chief executive officer for Boys & Girls Club of East Mississippi. To that end, Hood, Rick Jr., and Hood's agent Travis King are in Cleveland this week looking for an inner city high school basketball program to adopt, and for a Boys & Girls Club to partner with for holiday charities like turkey and clothing drops.

They'd like to make it an annual thing.

"Just because he signed the qualifying offer, he's not on the first train out of here," King said. "He plans to stay in Cleveland."

What went wrong?

The Rodney Hood the Cavs hoped they acquired when they shipped Jae Crowder to the Utah Jazz as part of a three-team deal at last season's trade deadline is the one who statistically was enjoying the finest of his four pro seasons (16.8 ppg) before the trade.

When the playoffs arrived, Hood blew out two tires and dragged his muffler along the pavement. He averaged 5.4 points, shot .167 from 3, and posted that plus-minus of minus-93.

Again, nobody was worse. Along the way, he refused a request from Lue to take the floor at the end of a blowout of Toronto in Game 4 of the conference semifinals. As if things weren't bad enough, with Hood having played his way out of the rotation, he was now embarrassed.

With the Cavs gasping for air in the Finals and the Warriors tightening their grip, Lue turned back to Hood for Games 3 and 4 and he fared better.

That's what happened to Hood on the court. Off of it, in addition to the trade, his wife was pregnant with twins. She gave birth on the morning of Game 2 of the first round of the playoffs.

Son Rich and daughter Riley had some nerve, refusing to sleep through the night while dad was trying to help the Cavs beat the Pacers.

There was also the matter of playing alongside LeBron, in what turned out to be his last year in Cleveland, with his Finals streak on the line. Losses were magnified. Wins were expected. Every shot was either taken by LeBron or facilitated through him, or so it seemed.

Hood doesn't use those items as excuses, exactly. It's just, well, that's what was happening around him while he was dealing with the worst stretch of his pro career.

"It was a lot of stuff going on where I just couldn't really focus, until the time where I really wasn't playing," Hood said. "And then I was able to lock in and get to myself.

"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," he continued. "I want to be a big part of a really good team, so that was my focus this whole summer."

Summer fun

The other summer focus for Hood was his restricted free agency. King listed the clubs that showed interest in Hood (including three playoff teams) and said there were offers, but they were in the $5.3 million to $8 million range, depending on the team's cap situation.

Hood was looking for a deal in the $10 million to $12 million range. The Cavs weren't going to go there, either, but they offered him a multiyear deal for about $7 million per season, sources said.

With LeBron gone, Hood is going to be the Cavs' second scoring option behind Kevin Love. They see Hood as a shooting guard with Cedi Osman slated to play the small forward spot. Lue has told him the Cavs will play faster (Lue always says that, but with LeBron gone they just may do it now), and Hood will get a chance to be himself on the court.

Hood understands the basketball opportunity he has in front of him -- there's money to be made by anyone who can help fill the 28 points, nine rebounds, and nine assists LeBron took with him to the Lakers.

Hood said he wasn't "comfortable" with what the Cavs were offering, and he correctly noted the NBA's salary cap is expected to rise from $101 million this season to $109 million next -- so there will be more teams with more money to offer him next year.

But to hear him tell it, he wants the Cavs to be the team cutting his checks.

"My twins were born here," he 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."