Darius Garland needs to be more efficient finishing near the rim next season for the Cleveland Cavaliers.
During his rookie campaign, while Darius Garland was still affected by his meniscus injury which cut his lone season short at Vanderbilt, per a report from Cleveland.com’s Chris Fedor, Garland’s season was not up to his standards. A foot injury in the early going of training camp didn’t allow him to start off on the right, well, foot, heading into the season for the Cleveland Cavaliers, either.
Garland did become more comfortable in the last two or so months of the season for Cleveland, though, on the plus side. Garland having 5.1 assists per outing to 2.6 turnovers per game in his last 26 games of 2019-20 was a positive sign, and hopefully his playmaking feel from 2020 on continues heading into 2020-21.
That said, nobody can objectively say that Garland’s 12.3 points per game on just 40.1 percent shooting in 2019-20 lived up to expectations, with Garland’s tight handle and natural shooting ability, both off-the-bounce and off-the-catch.
Now, Garland having an effective field goal shooting clip of 44.6 percent on pull-ups, per NBA.com’s shot tracking data, was very respectable for a rookie, and from one that only played five collegiate games, in particular. Garland hitting 39.2 percent of his catch-and-shoot three-point attempts was a pretty healthy hit rate, too.
Garland did prove to be effective in relation to his floater game, too, in the same way as Collin Sexton, which was good to see. Nonetheless, next season, we do need to see more from Garland as a scorer, and while he will still obviously be more of a perimeter-oriented scorer, undoubtedly, one area jumps out for him for 2020-21.
Finishing is clearly a point of emphasis for Garland for the Cleveland Cavaliers.
It’s no secret, but Garland was not an effective finisher in year 1, although I do cut him some slack as a 6-foot-1 rookie guard, and one that was seemingly still affected by that injury he suffered at Vandy. Garland only converted on 44.1 percent of his shot attempts in the restricted area, per NBA.com’s shooting data.
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For context, the league average in that area is typically around 60.0 percent, so Garland clearly has a ways to go in his development there and he’ll need to show improvement there next season.
What I believe could aid Garland as a finisher, though, would be a productive offseason heading into 2020-21 when hopefully he’s been able and will continue to be able to get stronger and more explosive.
Based on Garland’s comments in Fedor’s aforementioned report from last month, Garland is 100 percent, and ideally again, next season, we’ll see him with a stronger frame and hopefully, him not second guessing on-ball can allow him to be able to generate more space.
Those things would help Garland be more efficient as a finisher, and while near-league average might be tough still, Garland would be showing real growth if he hit in the 56.0 percent-ish range in the restricted area in 2020-21.
If Garland’s able to show real strides in that regard, it would only open up more playmaking opportunities for him. That’d mean feasibly more effective dump-offs to the likes of Kevin Love and Andre Drummond, who fully intends to pick up his player option for next season. That could open up more lobs to Drummond, Larry Nance Jr. and/or Kevin Porter Jr. with DG being a more viable threat as a finisher, too.
Garland himself would be more unpredictable to guard in the pick-and-roll and/or off-bounce game, and that would make him even more dangerous as a step back threat, if he’s more capable as a driving finisher. It’d be nice for Garland to get more free throw chances than just 1.2 per game as he did last season as well, as I previously touched on.
Now I’m not going to expect Garland to ever be nearly the finisher of say, Porter, but next season, it would pay dividends for DG if he were to be more respectable near the basket. That’d clearly help him in a variety of ways as an off-the-bounce player, both in the scoring and playmaking sense.
Cleveland could potentially look to draft LaMelo Ball of the NBL’s Illawarra Hawks, for example, who is reportedly in their top tier of 2020 prospects, and that could eventually lead to them trading Garland in the near future, one would think. Albeit if Cleveland went with a wing such as Auburn’s Isaac Okoro or a 3/4 in Florida State’s Patrick Williams, for instance, DG will still be running the show often.
Swinging back again, though, it’s evident either way, it’s no secret that a clear point of emphasis for Garland is him being a better finisher near the basket to counter his perimeter game, which will be his scoring bread and butter.