The three biggest questions about the Cavaliers’ offseason
By Corey Casey
The Cleveland Cavaliers are now amid their real season, and after showing some bright spots post-All-Star break, some big questions remain, and they will likely be answered in the coming months.
The Cleveland Cavaliers finished up the 2018-19 season with a 19-63 record, and now are in the middle of what figures to be a extremely active offseason for them. On the surface when you look at their record it’s easy to say it was a long season for them, but it was also a relative success considering they’re in a rebuild and they saw a lot of growth from players that likely established themselves as pieces, in Collin Sexton and Cedi Osman.
Post-All-Star break, Sexton averaged 20.8 points on 55.0% effective field goal shooting, to go with 3.2 assists and 2.4 rebounds per game, while also shooting 41.3% from three-point range (per NBA.com).
One of the knocks on Sexton when he was drafted out of Alabama was his perimeter shot, and as his rookie season went on he immensely improved in that area of his game, and for the season overall, Sexton shot 40.2%. His passing wasn’t fantastic, really, but his decision-making, as we’ve often touched on here at KJG, got considerably better as his rookie season progressed.
He wasn’t very good defensively as a rookie, no, but I think as the rest of his body fills out and he gets stronger, he’ll become a better defender, as Sexton reportedly has an amazing work ethic and he’s already shown he’s fully capable of turning a weakness into a strength.
All in all, what Sexton showed as a rookie should give the Cleveland Cavaliers’ organization plenty of reason to be optimistic.
Cedi Osman in his first year starting also improved a great deal, and post-All-Star break, averaged 14.0 points on 51.8% effective field goal shooting, to go with 4.8 rebounds and 3.2 assists per game, and shot 38.8% from three-point range (per NBA.com).
Sexton and Osman both showed a ton of promise in year one of the rebuild, and project as two building block pieces going forward.
The Cavs haven’t started their offseason this early in several years, as at this time the last few years they were preparing for long runs to the NBA Finals. However, with a rebuilding team it’s different this time around.
Here are probably the three biggest questions that will need to be answered about Cleveland’s offseason.