The CEO himself was a Horowhenua representative when his side had beaten the Bay, robbing a stronger district of an opportunity to challenge.
"Smaller associations might not be the strongest or win challenges but more often then not they are competitive," he said, putting their slump down to a cyclical phase.
"Every now and then they go through a bad year but I've got no doubt there are issues that are making it difficult for them to be competitive."
Horowhenua had three players in the CD A team this summer so it wasn't fair to suggest they were weak, he said, adding every one of the eight CD districts had a presence in the flagship Devon Hotel Central Districts Stags squad this summer.
Hood says the Bay will be the first to agree not too many home-grown players have passed through their system to the Stags.
Many players, such as captain Kruger van Wyk, Black Caps test bowler Doug Bracewell, seamer Andrew Mathieson, Kieran Noema-Barnett, Ben Smith, have come from other provinces to base themselves in the Bay.
The only Bay-born player in the Stags is Complete Flooring Napier Technical Old Boys seamer Stevie Smidt, who is also Bay men's captain although he has predominantly carried the drinks during the Ford Trophy campaign, which the Stags won last Sunday.
Ruahine Motors Central Hawke's Bay seamer Blair Tickner is 12th man in CD's first-class Plunket Shield match against the Otago Volts in Queenstown that was to start yesterday. Unfortunately, rain washed out the day's play.
Hood intends to meet Hawke's Bay Cricket Association CEO Craig Findlay and HBCA board chairman Derek Stirling to address the issue.
"We need to look at how best we can get national title-winning Christian Leopard in the New Zealand Under-17 team to progress as far as we would hope he can," he said of Leopard, who was part of the CD age-group team that won the national under-17 crown last month.
The Napier Boys' High School student scored an impressive century, joining fellow CD teammates Taylor Williams and Ma'ara Ave in the national side.
The Hawke Cup, Hood says, has a significant role to play but isn't the overwhelming factor in helping nurture developing players to a pedigree standard.
"We see Hawke's Bay as the biggest area and the largest population so we hope to get the systems right to develop high-quality players, not just for CD but New Zealand."
He salutes Stags coach Heinrich Malan and his men for claiming the 2014-15 bragging rights to the 50-over Ford Trophy.
It is in keeping with CD's pre-season ideology of development, although not everyone buys into it.
"The side has come on in leaps and bounds with the faith shown in their ability and now many major associations will be looking at the talented group of youngsters who have come through," he says, singling out Dane Cleaver and Tom Bruce.
"Not many people outside were banking on them to be match-winning players but towards the end of the season those guys stood out," he says of Bruce's 88 on debut against a star-studded Otago Volts in the one-day preliminary final.
Remaining loyal to the current crop of CD players, he says, is imperative even though some people still don't believe in their philosophy.
"We know what we're about and genuinely in what we believe we have," Hood says, adding they expected to see results from their programme but not that early.
Hood this week reassured fans that a proposal to redefine major association boundaries will affect CD Cricket but he didn't see it happening any time soon.
"I think there's a lot of water to go under the bridge before we even consider the effect it's likely to have on CD from a financial perspective. It's far too early in the process to say it'll even get beyond a couple of news stories," Hood said yesterday amid reports Cricket Wellington were keen to woo Wairarapa and Horowhenua-Kapiti from CD's geographically fragmented eight-district catchment area.
Hood confirmed Cricket Wellington had sent a letter of intent to NZ Cricket and the major associations, asking to revisit their boundaries.
