Cavs: Cedi Osman’s three-point rate will likely keep increasing from here

Cedi Osman’s primary role will be as a catch-and-shoot player looking onward for the Cleveland Cavaliers.

This now-past season for the Cleveland Cavaliers, wing Cedi Osman had a healthy 38.3 percent hit rate from three-point range, which was his career-best to this point of his three seasons. That was a positive for Osman, who has been Cleveland’s regular starting 3 for the past two years.

It is evident, though, due to him being fairly limited on-ball and being a pretty average finisher, and having all kinds of issues on-ball defensively against opposing 3’s mostly due to a lack of lateral quickness, that Osman isn’t Cleveland’s long term starting 3.

Cedi had 11.0 points per outing in 2019-20, which was somewhat underwhelming, but Kevin Love being mostly healthy played into that likely, along with Collin Sexton and Darius Garland of course having their considerable share of on-ball work. Nonetheless, Osman had stretches last season where he seemingly disappeared on the offensive end, and his on-ball presence wasn’t felt nearly enough as a driver, quite frankly.

Especially in regards to the defensive end, I could very well see the Cavaliers looking to go with a wing in the 2020 NBA Draft, such as Auburn’s Isaac Okoro, Florida State’s Devin Vassell, who could both be defensive upgrades in the near future for Cleveland.

That’s in Okoro’s case, even more so, who at 6-foot-6, 225 pounds is as switchable as it gets and for a Cavs team that needs to value defensive prospects highly, that could be a very impactful addition.

Now Sports Illustrated‘s Sam Amico did report earlier this week that an opposing NBA executive “strongly” believes the Cavs will end up trading away their #5 overall selection, along with seemingly “several” SI sources, per Amico.

But I frankly firmly believe Cleveland will end up making that selection, due to them being able to land a high quality defensive piece there, such as Okoro again or potentially Deni Avdija of the I-BSL’s Maccabi FOX Tel Aviv. It’s so early in relation to the draft, which is currently slated for mid-October, but the league is looking to push back, per a report from ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski.

Granted, I could feasibly see Dylan Windler, who is reportedly progressing well in regards to complications involving a stress reaction in his left leg that kept him out of 2019-20, potentially overtake Osman at the 3 position at some point next season as well.

Windler hit 40.6 percent of his 534 three-point attempts in a four-year collegiate career at Belmont, and is more capable as a shooter off-movement than Osman (although Cedi has shown flashes of that). Windler could be a sharpshooter for the Cavs, as KJG’s Matthew Fagan alluded to, and he’s a more polished pull-up shooter than Cedi and could have a higher volume in that realm, and he averaged 21.3 points per game in 2018-19 as a senior at Belmont.

He’ll take some time to get adjusted to the NBA game, however, and Windler potentially starting might be too lofty for next season.

Anyhow, swinging back to Osman, who I’d imagine would be Cleveland’s starting 3 for at least some time into next season either way but is realistically a solid long term bench piece looking forward, the key for him is leaning into a catch-and-shoot role.

Furthermore, Osman’s three-point rate will likely keep steadily increasing from here for the Cleveland Cavaliers.

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From this point forward, I’d imagine we’ll see Cedi Osman primarily in a catch-and-shoot role, to re-emphasize, which for I’d think a rotational piece, in the long term sense, is just fine.

Osman should be able to still get some straight-line driving chances, too, and will, along with some cutting looks, but it’s apparent he’ll likely be more of a spot-up threat for the Cavaliers looking forward.

Osman hit 38.8 percent of his catch-and-shoot three-point attempts in 2019-20, per NBA.com’s shot tracking data, which is a healthy clip. His frequency in those situations was a robust 41.2 percent as well, which I’d expect to be the norm and/or that to steadily increase from here, also.

Assuming Osman fully leans into that role, and hopefully grows further into a more capable off-movement shooter, which I think he definitely can and we did see flashes of, Osman’s overall three-point rate will likely keep steadily increasing from here.

During this now-past season, Osman’s three-point attempt rate was a hefty 52.7 percent, after it was a bit less at 44.3 percent in year 2. From here, though, factoring in pieces such as still Love, Sexton, Garland, Kevin Porter Jr. and to an extent, Dylan Windler on-ball, I’d expect Osman to again be mostly a catch-and-shoot contributor in his minutes-share.

That’s what played out last season, but could very well be more so in the near future, ideally for the Cleveland Cavaliers. Now, Osman does have good passing instincts and I won’t discount that, but as a scorer, don’t expect a ton of on-ball work for Cedi from here, considering Cleveland should have capable on-ball threats in coming years.

Albeit Osman has worked hard to firmly establish himself as a real perimeter shooter for the Cavs, and as a result, should still get his chances to fire away. His three-point rate I’d expect to be in 55.0-56.0 percent range next season, and keep on the upward trend from there, even if that’s just in a rotational sense more.

For Osman, hopefully he can only keep improving from deep, too, though his 2019-20 clip was a productive clip. In any case, Cavs fans should expect to see Osman further lean into a catch-and-shoot/spot-up role for the Wine and Gold, as that’s how he’s probably best utilized going forward.

We’ll have to see what plays out in regards to his minutes-share next season, though.