Cavs: Darius Garland has to be ready for the traps to come his way

As we’ve often highlighted here at KJG, Cleveland Cavaliers young lead guard Darius Garland projects as a shooter that has incredible range and appears to have a heck of a handle, so with that, he has to be ready for a ton of defensive attention.

The Cleveland Cavaliers drafted 19-year-old lead guard Darius Garland with the fifth overall selection in the 2019 NBA Draft likely due to his high ceiling as a scorer.

Realistically, it’s Garland’s ability to fill it up both as a shooter off-the-catch and even moreso, off-the-bounce, that appears to be what could potentially be the reason he becomes an NBA All-Star some point down the road.

KJG contributors have hit on how yes, Garland only appeared in five games in college at Vanderbilt in his one season there in 2018-19 due to a reported meniscus tear, but as we’ve also emphasized, many draft pundits were seemingly of the belief that had Garland been able to showcase what he can do with a bigger sample size, that he may have been more in the running for the best point guard prospect in the 2019 NBA Draft (whereas Murray State’s Ja Morant, who is now on the Memphis Grizzlies, was widely-considered that after his stellar last season).

Garland’s scoring repertoire was definitely on display in that short time at Vandy, as he put in 16.2 points per game on 63.9% effective field goal shooting (per Sports Reference).

Perhaps most notably, he knocked in 47.8% of his three-point attempts (again, per Sports Reference).

Additionally, as we’ve referenced, ESPN NBA Draft Analyst Mike Schmitz has detailed how Garland was clearly one of the top talents in the 2019 NBA Draft, and demonstrated how Garland has a ton of potential, in large part due to his great ball-handling prowess that should enable him to fill it up via the pick-and-roll and in isolation at the next level.

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Garland is a player that has tons of potential as an off-the-dribble shooter and eventually, as a dynamic scorer from all three levels, and though I’m not saying he’ll be just like point guards that have elite range, such as the Portland Trail Blazers’ Damian Lillard or a player going into his second season in the Atlanta Hawks’ Trae Young, with Garland’s deep range and outstanding handle that makes him very difficult to handle in one-on-one situations or in pick-and-roll, he needs to be prepared for a bunch of traps coming his way in coming years.

That is often what talented lead guards have to deal with, especially early on in their careers.

While Garland does not seemingly have nearly the passing ability and/or vision Young has (Young had 8.1 assists per game as a rookie in 2018-19, per Basketball Reference), Garland does reportedly have good vision and in order to counter traps coming, he’ll need to make good decisions when the doubles do come to him.

The more he does that, obviously the harder he’ll be to defend for opponents.

Now will Garland face this high of a doubling frequency in PnR, as Soaring Down South tweeted about (via ESPN’s “NBA: The Jump”) in relation to Young?

Probably not, but with Garland projecting to have a similar scoring repertoire as a deep off-the-bounce shooter like Young, Garland will likely face his fair share of doubles, and he’ll again, need to steadily progress as a passer out of those situations, and additionally, if he becomes more able to play off the ball in minutes with players such as Collin Sexton and/or Matthew Dellavedova on the court with him, it’ll open up more and more opportunities for Garland himself to get open looks as a shooter and/or cutter, and he’ll help space the floor for players such as Cedi Osman, Kevin Love, Larry Nance Jr., Kevin Porter Jr. and Ante Zizic better as a result.

As we’ve often mentioned, though, there’s going to be growing pains for Garland in the near future.

That’s of course understandable, however, as there always are for young point guards, as that is probably the position with the hardest adjustment early on for NBA players.

With the veteran presence of Dellavedova and Brandon Knight, at least early on, though, I would imagine those two will definitely help Garland progress as a decision-maker in the pick-and-roll, and though neither have the logo-type range Garland has, they’ve both been around the block as NBA guards, so the more film study with them and the more influence Cleveland head coach John Beilein can have on him, I would think the better prepared Garland will be for opponents trapping him and forcing him to contribute in other ways than as a deep off-the-bounce primary scorer.

If Garland can initiate ball-swings first and utilize relocation in the earlier portion of the season, it’ll make it more difficult for opponents to trap him as the season progresses, likely cut down on his turnovers, develop better chemistry with pieces such as Love, and make Garland more unpredictable as an on-the-ball creator, too.

So now to the ever-important question, anyhow.

Is Garland in favor of allowing doubling in open gyms?

I’m not sure at this point if he has a definitive take for either way, but we’ll probably find out at some point soon.