Cleveland Cavaliers head coach John Beilein mentioned how the Darius Garland-Kevin Porter Jr. pairing have a budding chemistry, and the promise between these two as a tandem is a nice gift for Cavs fans in coming years.
As fans of the Cleveland Cavaliers know, coming seasons will be primarily about the growth of the team’s young pieces, and not the team’s record, which is currently 9-21 in the 2019-20 season. A few of those youngsters include 2019 NBA Draft selections in Darius Garland and via reported draft trade, Kevin Porter Jr.
Fellow 2019 rookie Dylan Windler (who’s not appeared yet due to a reported stress reaction in his left leg), along with Collin Sexton and Cedi Osman fall into that young-piece-to-watch realm as well, but here, I’m going to mostly discuss Garland and Porter as a budding pairing for the Cavaliers.
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In recent games, Garland has gotten significant run with the second unit throughout, as the starting pairing of Garland and Sexton has been staggered a bunch.
That’s then put Garland at the controls often, with Jordan Clarkson in there, along with Porter, and Larry Nance Jr. and John Henson.
That won’t include Clarkson anymore, though, who was reportedly traded to the Utah Jazz shortly before Cleveland’s game Monday against the Atlanta Hawks.
Anyhow, Porter has previously hit on how he and Garland are very close off the floor, and us Cavs fans, along with head coach John Beilein are seeing the Garland-KPJ pairing’s really starting to get comfortable playing alongside one another throughout games. That’s going to be a nice gift in coming years for fans of the Wine and Gold, too.
Here’s what Beilein said in regards to the budding chemistry of the pairing after Monday’s win over Atlanta, which made it three straight for Cleveland, and after both players were big in the fourth quarter.
"Everybody should be really excited with those two on the floor."@cavs coach John Beilein is high on Darius Garland and Kevin Porter Jr.#BeTheFight pic.twitter.com/B6k7GxCT2M
— Bally Sports Cleveland (@BallySportsCLE) December 24, 2019
Clearly, Garland and Porter were huge versus the Hawks with ten and nine fourth-quarter points, according to NBA.com, and though as Beilein essentially noted, there will be growing pains, the two 19-year-olds feed off each other really well.
Thus far, the player with the second-most assists to KPJ is Garland, (who leads Cleveland in assists per game, for reference) as shown by NBA.com’s player tracking data, and with the way KPJ has shown plenty as a lob threat and with Darius’ vision seeing those plays after attacking hard closeouts, I’d expect more and more of this in years ahead.
INTERGALACTIC STRENGTH! pic.twitter.com/vquxQcBK1d
— Cleveland Cavaliers (@cavs) December 19, 2019
While Garland hasn’t gotten nearly as much of a frequency of passes to him from Porter with players such as Sexton, Osman and Kevin Love often on the floor with Darius, Garland has shot 52.4% on passes from KPJ, including 46.2% from three-point range (again, per NBA.com’s shot tracking data).
Often times when the two are on the floor together, it’s awesome to see Porter hitting Garland behind the arc with extra passes, especially considering Garland is shooting 37.2% from three-point range on 4.8 attempts per game now in 2019-20.
Furthermore, with Clarkson no longer in the rotation with the Cleveland Cavaliers, Porter should have more playmaking opportunities, which should help him in his progression under the tutelage of Beilein and others. Porter will likely have more than 8.1 points per game at the end of his rookie year with seemingly an increased workload as the year progresses.
Moreover, whether or not Porter eventually starts alongside Garland, seemingly for Collin Sexton, as our own Corey Casey is on board with, the budding chemistry of the Garland-KPJ pairing is a gift that will keep on giving in coming years.
Again, regardless of KPJ’s role as an eventual starter or if he becomes a key initiator for Cleveland’s bench with Clarkson no longer in the rotation, the way Porter and Garland feed off one another is really encouraging and Beilein is spot-on, we should all be excited for that tandem in years ahead.
Lastly, on behalf of the KJG team, have an amazing Christmas, Hanukkah and/or holiday season, Cavs fans! Thanks as always for reading!