Cleveland Cavaliers: Post-All-Star break expectations for 2019-20

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The Cleveland Cavaliers will probably have plenty of losses pile up in the 2019-20 season with the team focused on their full-rebuild and getting young players big minutes to learn, but in doing so, those young pieces should hit their stride more post-All-Star break.

Objectively speaking, the Cleveland Cavaliers and their fan base have to know that the 2019-20 season won’t be filled with a bunch of wins.

This team was picked to finish with the lowest amount of wins in the NBA next season and have a repeating 19-63 record, according to Bleacher Report’s Andy Bailey, and though I see the Cavs having more than that because I would think Kevin Love (who only appeared in 22 games in 2018-19, per Basketball Reference) will be playing more regularly, at least I would hope, it’ll be a long season again.

Nonetheless, from a fan’s perspective, the Cavs should be much more entertaining than they were for most of last year, because young pieces Cedi Osman, Collin Sexton and Ante Zizic will be a bit more experienced, and the team’s three 2019 NBA Draft picks Darius Garland, Dylan Windler and Kevin Porter Jr., should gradually improve from game experience as the year moves along.

That’s what leads me to my post-All-Star break expectations for the Cavs in the 2019-20 season (so focusing on exclusively the 2020 part of the schedule, and you can view the season schedule here, courtesy of the team). KJG’s own Robbie DiPaola focused on expectations for pre-All-Star break in a recent article, for the record.

So looking at right after the All-Star break, let’s glance at February, which has six more games in the schedule after All-Star festivities at United Center, the home of the Chicago Bulls.

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In the six games closing out February, the Cavs first have a road back-to-back against the Washington Wizards and Miami Heat (and they then play the Heat again right after at home), followed by the Philadelphia 76ers, New Orleans Pelicans and Indiana Pacers to wrap the month.

I realistically see the Cavs maybe beating the Wizards and the Heat one of those times, and followed likely by losses to tough matchups.

In the breakdowns of these months, though, I’m going to focus more on the progression of individual pieces, and mainly the youngsters such as Sexton, Osman, Zizic, Garland, Windler and Porter.

One could probably recall that Sexton and Osman grew considerably in their play last season, at least on the offensive end, and Sexton, in particular, really shined post-All-Star break in 2018-19, as DiPaola referenced, with 20.8 points per game on 58.5% true shooting (per NBA.com), and led Cleveland in scoring in that stretch of play.

I’d imagine around this time, Sexton and Garland will probably be more comfortable with one another in minutes on the floor together, along with Osman, who I’d think will be more knowledgable of how to play off of Sexton and Garland, along with Kevin Love at this point (assuming Love is on the healthier side).

Before the All-Star break, I’d imagine that it will take a good amount of time for Garland and Porter to hit their strides and really, I’d expect both to take well to the All-Star break, and in this six-game stretch to end the season and for the post-All-Star break stretch of 28 games, I think both will see an uptick in production as scorers, and perhaps make better decisions as playmakers.

In this six-game stretch, I could see Garland, with more minutes than earlier in the season with likely one or two of Jordan Clarkson, Matthew Dellavedova or Brandon Knight (all expiring guards) out of the picture via trade, averaging about 15.8 points on 55.0% true shooting, and 4.3 assists per game, while Porter also gets more minutes-share and puts up around 10.6 points on 56.6% true shooting and 2.8 assists per game (with some more rotational playmaking duties than pre-All-Star).

In relation to Windler, I think with him likely having an off-ball/three-point specialist skill set and being an instinctive cutter, that his post-All-Star break performance won’t see a big increase, because I think his numbers will be pretty consistent in the eighth man or so realm of about 8.0 or so points per game on an efficient clip mostly from three-point range, say 37.0% from there.

Zizic I would imagine could see his numbers rise, though, too, and just like DiPaola hit on, I would think post-All-Star and post-deadline, he’ll take advantage of more chances with expiring bigs Tristan Thompson and/or John Henson likely off the roster at this point in time.

So again, as February is concerned, I would think the Cavaliers will play relatively well and Larry Nance Jr. gets the team re-engaged, but that schedule is not easy, with Philly, New Orleans and Zion Williamson and company and the Pacers, in particular.

I see that being probably a 1-5 stretch there, but the rookies get a much-needed second wind, along with head coach John Beilein, who is brand new to the NBA coaching ranks, and the team at least hangs around for two-and-a-half quarters of games before the head-scratching/disastrous mistakes come, on the defensive end of the floor, mostly.

On to March then.