Cavs tweet reiterates the shooting ability is there for Darius Garland

Darius Garland had a fairly underwhelming rookie season in the scoring sense, but he’s fully capable of a bounce back in 2020-21.

Nobody can say that Darius Garland really lived up to his billing as what could’ve been a knockdown shooter off-the-bounce for the Cleveland Cavaliers.

Leading into last season, it was evident that Garland’s shooting, both off-the-catch and off-the-bounce, was the reason Cleveland drafted him fifth overall in the 2019 NBA Draft.

While Garland gets somewhat of a pass to me, given that he only played five games in his collegiate career at Vanderbilt due to a meniscus tear, we’ll need to see him improve his efficiency in year two.

Now Garland was seemingly overthinking with that prior injury in the back of his mind, but he should be ready to roll in 2020-21 and shouldn’t be second-guessing, per a report from Cleveland.com’s Chris Fedor. Nonetheless, Garland’s second season will be a pivotal one for his outlook with the Cavs; DG needs to show more as a creating scorer.

I still believe Garland and Collin Sexton should have some more time together, and hopefully with a more capable wing often defensively than Cedi Osman. 2020 NBA Draft prospects such as Auburn’s Isaac Okoro, Florida State’s Devin Vassell or perhaps a hybrid 3/4 in Florida State’s Patrick Williams would seem to fit that mold for long stretches.

On the plus side in Garland’s case, he showed encouraging signs as a playmaker, averaging 5.1 assists per outing in his last 26 games active of 2019-20. His instincts in that realm were a big positive from my perspective, and he’ll continue to grow there and was meshing with Kevin Love, Kevin Porter Jr. and others more as his rookie year progressed.

More from King James Gospel

• 3 possible starting lineups for Cleveland Cavaliers in 2023-24
• The Cavaliers may have snagged a hidden gem in Craig Porter Jr.
• 4 players the Cavaliers should pursue in 2024 free agency
• 6 players Cavaliers might replace Jarrett Allen with by the trade deadline
• This stat is one to keep an eye on for Cavaliers’ Max Strus in years ahead

That said, we need to see more in the scoring/shooting sense from Garland, and even from having more aggression in that regard on a game-to-game basis. Did his prior injury play into that?

It would seem to have based on Fedor’s report, and hopefully, Garland, who does have a superb handle, can take advantage of that and generate space off-the-bounce as a shooter more consistently in 2020-21.

Garland hitting only 40.1 percent of his shots in 2019-20 was disappointing, and he’s a much better shooter than that.

I firmly believe he’ll improve in that realm in year two/going forward, though, and in terms of a positive spin, Garland was more respectable from three-point range, comparatively.

He hit not a knockdown level at 35.5 percent from deep, but he did hit a healthy 39.2 percent on catch-and-shoot three-point attempts, per NBA.com’s shot tracking data.

Moreover, recently, with the Cavs putting the focus on Garland this week as their featured player across their social media outlets, a recent tweet highlighted by them reiterated the shooting ability is there for Garland.

That tweet showed the shooting capability is there for DG, but we need to see it more for the Cleveland Cavaliers.

The Cavaliers tweeted a stat putting Garland’s ability on display in terms of his perimeter shooting, which again I believe we’ll see more of in 2020-21.

That tweet from the Cavs again highlights how the ability is there for Garland in the scoring/shooting sense, but we need to see him show that more game-to-game throughout longer stretches. That seems to be a growing narrative heading into 2020-21.

In that early January span, though, it was Garland’s best stretch of his rookie campaign, as KJG’s Amadou Sow detailed. Then, Garland averaged 15.7 points and 6.0 assists per outing, and most importantly, he was looking to assert himself more in key stretches of games.

We saw him do that in plenty of flashes as a rookie, and it often paid off for him and helped open up more playmaking/realistic assist opportunities for others to counter that.

As this Cavs tweet hits on, the ability is there for Garland, especially as a shooter, but he just needs to demonstrate that more frequently. Too often as a rookie he seemed unwilling to get himself going and was passing up chances, even with his natural shooting ability. Cavs fans can attest to that.

Even so, Garland in 59 games did have 105 three-pointers made, becoming only the second Cavs rookie to hit the 100 triples made plateau, joining Sexton. The novel coronavirus pandemic didn’t get DG a chance to feasibly break that record for Sexton, as the Cavs ultimately won’t be an Orlando participant.

Albeit the Cavaliers could reportedly participate in a second NBA “bubble” of non-Orlando teams and eventually play four Summer League-type games, but either way, that milestone was still notable. That’s even with today’s NBA being so perimeter-oriented.

Plus, Garland (along with Sexton) did show very good touch on floaters as a rookie. Hopefully next season, though, we see him assert himself more game-to-game in the scoring sense, as that will only open up more playmaking opportunities for him/ball-swings to others.

Him hopefully getting stronger heading into 2020-21 could help him on both ends, too.

Swinging back, this Cavaliers tweet again reiterates that the ability is there for DG, but he just needs to let it fly more frequently to have more of a game-to-game impact. As Cavs fans know, we didn’t see that enough in year one.