It’s another day closer to NBA Basketball, so it is only right the SneakerReporter NBA Top 30 team countdown continues. We are now 28 days away from the stuff that will count, but we are a little over a week away from postseason hoops! Until then, keep updated on where your favorite team falls on the list.
This time up, day 28 features the Cleveland Cavaliers.
On the path of a youthful rebuild (just like a good half-quarter of the league), the Cleveland Cavaliers felt the brute effect of LeBron James’ departure for sunnier skies for the second time around and are routinely found in this spot of inoperability without their ace on the floor. Bron leaves Cleveland, again, and after he leaves, the Cavs post the worst record in the league, again.
In 2010-11, the Cavs transformed from surefire title contender to a surefire lottery pick team with a 19-63 record following the departure of Cleveland’s prodigal son as a free agent. In 2018-19, lightning struck twice. The Cavaliers, fresh off four straight NBA Finals appearances, dissolved to another 19-63 record after James packed up to go ball in Tinseltown.
Even with the media centered around the Cleveland Cavaliers’ next direction headed forward following former Cavs GM David Griffin’s exile to New Orleans, and lone all-star Kevin Love’s steadfastness in Northeast Ohio looming in the air, they failed in the offseason in attracting any of the major household names once the free agency period opened.
However, there is something remotely remarkable about the potential and talent of this young bunch, that Cavs fans and skeptics alike will see in the limelight someday. It is fair if you write off the Cavaliers right now, but there will be no excuse to fully write off these Cavaliers in a couple of years. The duo of Darius Garland and the defensively-gifted “Young Bull” Collin Sexton, and the addition of a pretty strong 2019 draft class could spell less gloomy days in The Land for years to come.
But not right away.
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28. Cleveland Cavaliers (22-60) – The Kyrie Irving Method, Abridged
These days, hope in Believeland is teetering. LeBron heads out West, and it’s like the whole city just crumbles to rubble, with only the belief in their Browns, sitting at 1-2 on the year swiftly dwindling. Then, there’s the Cleveland Indians, who are in a every-game-is-a-playoff-game scenario, with the slightest mishap costing them a spot in the wild card. Cleveland has, like it always has been, become a bleak, joy-inept town just waiting for what feels like unavoidable disappointment, again.
At least there is Ohio State Football, right?
And leave it to the team that, yes, snapped that 52-year championship drought back in 2016 when the Cavaliers completed the greatest come from behind series win in league history, beating the then “greatest team of all-time” Golden State Warriors in seven, down 3 games to 1 to give some optimism to those Clevelanders. Since then, its been anything but magical for Cleveland.
Back-to-back-to-back finals losses to the grotesquely-buffed Warriors left LeBron with only one option in his final contract year with the Cavs: pack your bags and head to Tinseltown to salvage at least a couple more championship opportunities in the packed Western Conference.
What LeBron left behind was a roster tethered from his “decision 2.0”, though it was years in the making. Seemingly toxic relationships led to disagreements between players and upper management, forcing stars like Kyrie Irving to demand trades and staples like LeBron to grow untrustworthy of those running the organization. Inefficient coaching selections forced the Cavs to go in other directions, leading up to Tyronn Lue’s firing back in October following their 0-6 start in 2018 and Cleveland’s lack to retain Larry Drew’s as their head in command.
On top of all that, a severe, league-wide mistrust of Cavs owner Dan Gilbert, left a huge blemish on Cleveland’s image that did nothing positive for being suitors for big-name free agents for the foreseeable future.
It is a new day and a fresh start in the land of the 2016 champs, and for good reason. New head coach coming from Michigan, or as Ohioans dub “that team up north” John Beilein is experiencing his first taste of NBA coaching after 37 years of instructing the collegiate level with gigs ranging from Canisius, Richmond, West Virginia, and 12 years at Michigan. Beilein never got around to winning a national title with the Wolverines, but visited a couple of Final Fours and won the Big Ten in consecutive seasons (2017, 18).
But the Cavaliers enter this year with uncertainty, and equal patience and pragmatism. It took the Cavs to trust an already developed pick and roll scorer and space creator to pick in Darius Garland, so that can only signify that they are willing to rebuild in the only way they know how to.
Hence, the Kyrie Irving method: rebuild the backcourt from the top down in the hopes that you can attract a max free agent someday, or have enough developed house tools
Garland’s game is eerily similar to that of Kyrie Irving. Only suiting up for six games as a Vanderbilt Commodore before a meniscus injury, Garland displayed skills that NBA scouts across the league drooled over. A marksman from deep, Garland shot 47.8 percent from 3 and averaged 16.2 points and 2.6 assists per game.
Garland was not afforded the chance to showcase his game in SEC play but displayed the jump shooting ability and offensive instincts that separated him from the pack as a High Schooler in his brief time under Commodores Head Coach Bryce Drew.
And also worth mentioning: his Dad, Winston Garland, played seven seasons in the NBA with the Warriors, Clippers, Nuggets, Rockets, and Timberwolves. So, there is that extra voice of advice for Garland right at home when the regular season has its trials and tribulations we all know it to have on rookies.
Alongside the prospect will be Collin Sexton who, in his second year, will have more of a prominent role in the offense, even more than his rookie season. He had a good overall 2018, scoring 16.7 points per game on 43 percent shooting. Sexton ended his rookie season strongly as well, averaging 23.1 points and 3.4 assists per game on 43.8 percent shooting from deep and a 51.4 percent field goal percentage throughout Cleveland’s final 21 games.
The Cavs’ backfield could be a double-edged sword if the scoring ability of Garland lives up to all scouts’ expectations, considering that we already have a basis of understanding Sexton’s impact on the floor. It is directly similar to Neil Olshey’s procedure of building the fear-inducing Portland backcourt of Damian Lillard and CJ McCollum, where dual efficiency, ball-handling, space creation, heavy big man usage in pick and roll sets to open the floor, and nightly consistency reign supreme.
Current Cavs GM Koby Altman may be getting this, and possibly more, by throwing Garland into the starting lineup at season’s beginning, so that chemistry can be implemented right out of the gates.
But, just having offense only does so much, and though both are skilled at scoring the basketball, the Cavaliers finished dead last in the NBA in 2018-19 with a defensive rating of 116.8 points allowed per 100 possessions.
Another negative: Garland and Sexton are both under 6’5, so pairing two 6-foot-2 guys on the perimeter doesn’t seem to be an optimal way to get those numbers to look better. So if the Garland-Sexton duo is to perform optimally, they’ll have to start by essentially, being Lillard-McCollum version 2.0, and hope to get enough stops.
If you think about it, that’s possible, considering that both McCollum and Lillard are both 6’3 and have undoubtedly thrived in this small-ball era. Maybe we’ll see the same with the new young duo in the NBA.
The Cavaliers also picked up USC’s Kevin Porter Jr. and Belmont’s Dylan Windler at the 2019 draft, and they look to be etched into a rotation that is a decent blend of veterans and young, experienced pieces. The Cavs did not make a big splash in free agency and only picked up Jarell Martin from Memphis and Sindaris Thornwell from the Clippers, which are not meaningless acquisitions by the slightest.
The starting 5 for the Cleveland Cavaliers is questionable, to say it nicely. And it may get worse, considering Kevin Love’s almost impending self-removal from Cleveland. He is 31 years old, entering his 11th season while coming off a toe injury that sidelined him for the rest of the 2018 season. With three years and $91.5 million still remaining on the four-year, $120 million extension he signed last summer, It is not a matter of if the Cavs are retaining Love, but rather when and where he will be dealt.
It could either be by the February trade deadline, or earlier, depending on how aggressive contenders want to sign the stretch big that averaged a double-double as a solid rebounder in just 23 games last year, even though he posted the second-worst overall shooting percentage of his career at 38.5 percent.
Looking at the Cavaliers roster, Tristan Thompson and Kevin Love look to fill the frontcourt roles Beilein needs to run the offense. Thompson’s defensive ratings have been just short of adequate in recurring seasons, and his productivity that has dropped in the past couple of years is something to certainly monitor.
But, the development of projects in Cedi Osman and Ante Zizic, and the extensive versatility of Larry Nance Jr., is paramount to a healthy future for the Cavs’ frontcourt epidemic and maybe a little more important than keeping Thompson’s contract.
The best-case scenario for the 2019-20 Cleveland Cavaliers? John Beilein’s young Cavs – composed of Collin Sexton, Cedi Osman, Darius Garland, Dylan Windler, Kevin Porter Jr., and Ante Zizic – are healthy in April and their development will be witnessed for Cleveland fans to see as a result of their year-long process of growing together and offensively complimenting each other while significantly improving their 2018 defensive rating.
Garland and Sexton will put the NBA world on notice that the McCollum-Lillard stronghold of the East is a real and viable threat, and the Cavs will have pride in their homegrown talent, regardless if Kevin Love bounces.
The raw prospect of Kevin Porter will prove his doubters wrong, show his maturity to the world and prove to scouts he shouldn’t have slipped to the second round of the draft. Dylan Windler will keep his hot hand from college and be a knockdown role player who will develop into getting a bigger role in 2020 and beyond. And head coach John Beilein will transition into the fast-paced environment of an NBA head coach with simplicity just like he was able to at Michigan.
If things don’t turn out that way, the Cavs could be in an even deeper hole than they are now. We’d find out quickly that Darius Garland should have stayed in school, and Collin Sexton’s inefficiency on both ends of the ball could cause the Cavs to look elsewhere for a starting 2 guard. Ante Zizic and Cedi Osman may not be worth the hype going into their third years, veterans will ask their agents to direct them to the nearest exit out of Ohio as if they are the Miami Dolphins, and Beilein may find himself back coaching college basketball as the Cavs lose even more games than in 2018.
If we know a thing or two about the bleak history of Cleveland sports, it’s more often than not the latter is the most undergone. Yet in the past decade, optimism has placed its warm cloak on the “factory of sadness” in bunches with the success of the Indians, and a little bit with the Browns. Maybe fun times can be ahead in Quicken Loans Arena, and this time, with the production of a skilled backcourt, and without the help of that kid from Akron.
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