It’s really unfortunate to hear that Cleveland Cavaliers rookie wing Dylan Windler reportedly could be sidelined for up to six weeks with lower leg discomfort, but at least that could maybe open up some more wing minutes for fellow rookie Kevin Porter Jr.
The Cleveland Cavaliers were ravaged by injuries this past season, and that didn’t help their cause in terms of being more competitive than they were, as reflected by a record of just 19-63 in 2018-19 (per NBA.com). On the plus side, though, they did embrace a full-rebuild in the process, and their rookies this season play right into that in the coming years.
The team and the fan base seems to have high hopes for Cleveland’s 2019 NBA Draft selections of guard Darius Garland and wings Dylan Windler and Kevin Porter Jr.
Unfortunately at this point, though, Cleveland might not have Windler in training camp and/or the preseason, and maybe even the start of the 2019-20 regular season, which is a big blow, really.
According to the team, Windler was “experiencing discomfort in his lower left leg following a series of recent team workouts.”
STATUS UPDATE: Cavs guard Dylan Windler will be sidelined for the start of the 2019-20 preseason after experiencing discomfort in his lower left leg following a series of recent team workouts.
— Cleveland Cavaliers (@cavs) September 27, 2019
MORE: https://t.co/LrnuLsruFy
The Cleveland Cavaliers would go on to give more detail as well in that update, and it appears that Windler could possibly not even make it back for the return of the regular season, which begins at the Orlando Magic on Oct. 23.
Here’s the majority of what the team would go on to note in that update.
"“Imaging at Cleveland Clinic Sports Health and evaluation by the Cavaliers medical staff revealed a left tibial stress reaction. Windler will now undergo a period of treatment and rehabilitation and his return to play will be approximately 4-6 weeks. His status will be updated as appropriate.”"
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This is really tough to hear as a fan of the Cavaliers, who really should be giving Windler a heavy dose of minutes even as a rookie in 2019-20, given that Windler (who shot 40.6% in four seasons from three-point land at Belmont, per Sports Reference) projects as one of the team’s best shooters and should definitely help space the floor for Cleveland’s primary driving threats in Collin Sexton, Cedi Osman, along with Garland and Porter.
Hopefully Windler’s injury heals fully so he’s back and ready to roll at the start of the regular season, but in the meantime, the Cavaliers can absolutely not rush the 23-year-old rookie wing/possible small-ball 4 back.
Though injuries are never great to deal with for anybody, let alone right off the bat in one’s NBA career and I hope Windler doesn’t have a nagging problem in his rookie year with his leg, a silver lining here could be that Porter, a fellow rookie wing, could be in line for more minutes-share in new Cleveland head coach John Beilein and the mostly-new coaching staff’s rotation.
Given that at least for the time being, the Cavs’ roster has a bunch of guards that could be deserving of meaningful minutes with expiring pieces Jordan Clarkson, Brandon Knight and Matthew Dellavedova also factored into the mix on the perimeter, and with Cleveland not having a bunch of natural small forwards (really only Osman and Windler at this point), I’d think they’d be playing Windler a bunch at the 3.
Playing off that, I’d think they’d feasibly play Osman and/or him at the 4 with Porter at the 3 a fair amount right off the bat to maximize spacing, considering that the team reportedly seems to have a good chance of rolling out a Garland-Sexton backcourt to start games (per Cleveland.com’s Chris Fedor) and is in a rebuild with no guaranteed plus defenders at this point outside of realistically Larry Nance Jr. and they aren’t loaded with great scoring bigs anyway.
With Porter not playing in Summer League at all due to a reported hip flexor injury, and with him having a rocky one collegiate season at USC of which our own Robbie DiPaola detailed, where Porter only had 9.5 points, played just 22.9 minutes per contest and only appeared in 21 out of 33 possible games (per Sports Reference), it would seem feasible that Porter wouldn’t be playing much early on in the season with the bunch of Cavs guards currently on the roster that could warrant meaningful minutes, along with the more proven Osman and really Windler seemingly in front of Porter when it comes to the 3.
With this injury to Windler potentially having him miss a significant part of training camp and/or preseason or even into the regular season, Porter could have a good chance of getting more familiar with pieces such as Garland, Clarkson or Delly in training camp/the preseason, and perhaps that could lead to him getting more meaningful burn earlier on in the 2019-20 season than I would’ve originally expected had Windler not maybe be sidelined to start the year and have Cleveland ease Porter into the rotation from then on more.
It’s not as though Porter wouldn’t have warranted playing time right off the bat, as he projects as one of the Cleveland Cavaliers’ best on-ball shot-creating options with his tight handle, explosiveness and ability to get separation by changing speeds, along with him quite possibly being one of the Cavs’ best perimeter defenders right away, but again, Porter had an underwhelming freshman season at USC.
Considering that and him not getting Summer League reps at all, it’d be realistic to think Beilein and company would have Porter wait in the wings a bit.
With this Windler unfortunate injury news, though, perhaps we’ll see more of KPJ, who was a 41.2% three-point shooter at USC (per Sports Reference) for the record, on the floor a decent amount right from the jump.
For reference, the Cleveland Cavaliers begin preseason play on Oct. 7, which involves four games of which they’ll conclude on Oct 15. As far as the entirety of the 2019-20 regular season schedule, you can view that here, per the team/NBA.com.