Cavs: 2 ways Dylan Windler should make Collin Sexton more lethal as scorer
By Dan Gilinsky
Dylan Windler should be able to make Collin Sexton even more dangerous for the Cleveland Cavaliers.
In his second season with the Cleveland Cavaliers, guard Collin Sexton led the Wine and Gold with 20.8 points per game. In his last 32 games active, Sexton had 23.6 points on 49.2 percent shooting, and hit 44.9 percent of his three-point attempts per game, too.
What was particularly noteworthy for Sexton was him showcasing the ability to change speeds off-the-bounce, which he didn’t demonstrate in his rookie year much.
With Sexton’s blazing speed and quickness, that only made him more capable of getting to his sweet spots as a scorer, and enabled him to get more separation for pull-ups in the mid-range area and helped him in the floater game, too.
Sexton’s improved strength paid dividends for him as well, and aided him as a finisher and him showing that feel for changing speeds enabled him to get a healthy 4.1 free throw attempts per game in year 2. That was an increase from 3.1 in year 1, and often allowed him to stay in-rhythm as a bucket-getter throughout games.
Additionally, Sexton further proved his catch-and-shoot viability, and hit 38.0 percent of his three-point attempts in 2019-20, often via spot-ups, and he was not hesitating much in that regard. That was a welcomed change from his first year, when he often did that before the All-Star break, and in his second year, that was key when those opportunities came along.
Sexton hit 42.1 percent of his catch-and-shoot three-point attempts during this now-past season, per NBA.com’s shot tracking data, and next season, with his feel for changing speeds he displayed in year 2, I’d imagine he’ll be a key pull-up three-point shooter for Cleveland as well. Sexton hit 35.0 percent on those looks in 2019-20, too.
Sexton also made strides as a cutter as last season progressed, which was encouraging to see, and led to feeds from players such as Darius Garland, Kevin Love and Larry Nance Jr.
Next season, I’d imagine that one particular player, though, should really open up things for Sexton and make him ever more lethal as a primary (and three-level) scorer for the Cavaliers. So who am I referring to, then?
That Cleveland Cavaliers player is Dylan Windler.
Dylan Windler should make Collin Sexton more capable as a scorer in their instances together next season. That’s if Windler, who missed all of 2019-20 due to complications regarding a stress reaction in his lower left leg, is able to be mostly healthy next season.
Windler has reportedly been recovering well from that, though, and I’d imagine that next season, he should be mostly ready to roll after an extended time to get ready. Of course, he’ll take some time to adjust to the NBA game. But Windler could be a knockdown shooter for the Cavs, as KJG’s Matthew Fagan detailed, and he could be a key rotational 2/3 option even early on.
So, we’ll highlight the first way he should help out Sexton as a scorer in their time on the floor together now.