Cavs: 3 players that’d benefit most from selection of Deni Avdija in 2020 NBA Draft

Darius Garland

Darius Garland‘s first year with the Cavs has been up-and-down, to say to the least, but he has shown some great flashes and has the potential to be the point guard of the future for this team. During his time at Vanderbilt, albeit a small sample size due to a meniscus injury, he showed off his impressive ball-handling ability and his deep range.

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After a successful workout with the Cavs, they decided to select him with the fifth overall pick in the 2019 NBA Draft.

Darius looked lost to start the season as it seemed as if he was trying to still get back up to game speed. After the game had started to slow down for him, though, we saw a ton of improvements and he had his best stretch in that first half of January.

From January 2 to January 18, he averaged 15.7 points and 6.0 assists per game on 42.5 percent from the field, 34.4 percent from three-point land, and 91.3% from the free throw line, according to Basketball Reference.

This upcoming offseason, assuming Garland’s current left groin strain isn’t completely hampering the rest of this 2019-20 season, should be a healthy one for Garland and would allow him to focus on improving his strength, conditioning and overall game rather than focusing on rehab.

Additionally for Garland, despite his low assist numbers, Avdija has shown an ability to be a facilitator and, as a secondary playmaker, he could find immense success. Avdija’s post passing acumen has been particularly promising, too, as FanSided’s Jackson Frank highlighted here.

Having another guy who could facilitate would allow Garland to focus more on scoring rather than passing. Currently, Garland is taking 11.8 shots per game and having him take just a few more shots could be the difference between a win and a loss.

Plus, Deni’s defensive ability and feel could make him the best perimeter defender on this team. Having someone with his size and higher ceiling on the defensive end than Osman could help to hide Garland’s defensive woes.

Lastly, as stated earlier, Deni is shooting shooting 38.8 percent from three in the I-BSL. This means that the Cavs would be adding another possible floor spacer and this added spacing would give Garland more room to operate on the court off-the-bounce.

The second player that comes to mind that’d benefit in a big way from the Cavs selecting Avdija in the 2020 NBA Draft is another 2019 Cavs’ draft selection.