Cleveland Cavaliers: What David Griffin Had To Say About The Return Of Kevin Love, Larry Sanders

Cleveland Cavaliers general manager David Griffin has updates Cavs fans on the return of Kevin Love and Larry Sanders.

Before the Cleveland Cavaliers game against the Detroit Pistons tonight, general manager David Griffin spoke about the returns of Kevin Love and Larry Sanders.

According to general manager David Griffin, Love is expected to return to court next week.

Love’s return will be a welcome sight for Cavs fans, as the team simply hasn’t looked the same without their All-Star power forward. Go figure right? Offensively, the Cavs are still able to space the floor with Channing Frye starting in place of him at the four ,or have a player who can shoot from the perimeter and post up if LeBron James slides down to the four with Richard Jefferson in the lineup. Nonetheless, without Love, there aren’t two players who can do both at an elite rate for the Cavs.

Though Love is a catch-and-shoot threat in the offense, Love will attack the rim from the perimeter and post-up as well. Love also is a player who, when playing beside Tristan Thompson, gives the Cavs an elite rebounding duo on the outside. Teams have taken to doubling Tristan Thompson under the rim so that he can’t gather rebounds but without Love’s box-out ability and lanky arms there to snag 11.1 rebounds per game, he’s consistently left fighting for rebounds by himself.

If Love returns next week, as planned, he could return in any of the four games they have that week. The Cavs are scheduled to play the Los Angeles Lakers, Denver Nuggets, Charlotte Hornets and Washington Wizards in that time. The Lakers would be the most ideal place for Love to return, as they aren’t a strong rebounding team and currently have the second-worst record in the NBA.

Love caused a stir when he posted this picture on Instagram earlier today:

Before the game, Griffin also spoke on the signing of Sanders. According to Chris Fedor of Advanced Ohio (cleveland.com). Sanders is expected to contribute more in the long-term than the short-term.

Sanders will play with the Canton Charge in the NBA D-League starting Saturday according to Fedor.

The Charge have five games between that day and April 1st, the day the NBA Development League’s regular season ends.

According to Chris Manning of Fear The Sword, playing about 10 minutes per game to start for a two-week period.

Sanders hasn’t played in the NBA since December 23, 2014 and will need time to get his legs back under him although he has still playing competitive basketball in his time off. If Sanders is to give Thompson any rest, he’ll need to be able to grab boards at the very least. With the burly NBA bodies in the NBA, that will require Sanders to have his legs beneath him.

Sanders, who regards shot-blocking as an art, is an athletic player who can make impact plays on the defensive end hopefully. However, it’s unreasonable to expect Sanders to do that consistently so early on in his NBA return.

An extra nugget about Sanders’ signing? They would have signed Sanders to the team regardless.

This may mean that they would have waived DeAndre Liggins this season to do it. It’s also possible that Griffin was implying that he was planning on signing Sanders in the offseason no matter what.

In any case, there’s reason to believe that Sanders is being believed in and the Cavs can see him playing a significant role for the team down the line. In my opinion, at best he starts games for the Cavs because he’s a bigger shot-blocking presence than Thompson. At worst, Sanders plays 10-15 serviceable minutes per game next season slowly regaining confidence and improving his production along the way.

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What do you think about Kevin Love’s return? What about the signing of Larry Sanders? Let us know in the comments section or Twitter @KJG_NBA.