Cavs: Further off-ball growth for Collin Sexton would have lasting effect

Collin Sexton should be the Cleveland Cavaliers primary option next season and perhaps looking onward.

With next season for the Cleveland Cavaliers in mind, it seems pretty clear that Collin Sexton should be the squad’s primary option. Even taking into account Kevin Love, in terms of on-ball, Sexton is option A.

Sexton leaned into a 2 guard role during this now-past season with the arrival of Darius Garland, and the former led Cleveland with 20.8 points per game. In his last 33 games, Sexton had 23.5 points per outing and in that span, he hit 44.4 percent of his 4.8 three-point attempts per contest.

Heading into the NBA season’s novel coronavirus-induced hiatus, Sexton was on quite a tear. The Cavs 2019-20 campaign would ultimately be over with them not being an Orlando team, but Sexton again next season we should see take even more of a leap as a scorer at all three levels.

That’s even more so due to how he displayed the capability of changing speeds in year 2, which he didn’t have in his repertoire in year 1.

Sexton also gained a considerable amount of good weight, as was stressed in recent reports in relation to the Cavs recent in-market bubble team workouts, and that should only aid him on both ends, frankly.

To me, though, what Sexton did seemingly show more glimpses of as this now-past season progressed was some off-ball growth. Of course, Sexton, who has firmly established himself as a very good three-point shooter, as evidenced by him hitting 39.2 percent from there in two seasons, has really gotten it done off-the-catch via spot-ups.

Sexton placed in the 74th percentile in 2019-20 on spot-ups, too, per Synergy Sports, and had an effective field goal shooting clip of 57.4 percent in those situations. So looking onward, Collin is not a player teams can be helping off of to drivers in hedging/stunting really hard, which is a huge plus for pieces such as Garland, Kevin Love and Kevin Porter Jr., among others.

That said, continued off-ball growth for Sexton would really pay dividends, in the cutting and off-movement shooting sense.

Further off-ball growth for Sexton would have a lasting effect for his game and the Cleveland Cavaliers.

To reiterate, Sexton did show progression off-ball as his past season wore on, and a point of emphasis for him in essentially this extended offseason from the Cavs coaching staff has reportedly been his off-ball growth.

Next season, while there weren’t a ton of instances of it in 2019-20, Sexton did show nice flashes as an off-screen shooter. We know Collin will get his share of hand-offs/pick-and-roll scoring situations, but Sexton placing in the 64th percentile in year 2, per Synergy, in off screen scoring scenarios was encouraging.

Hopefully Sexton takes that a step further next season, and I could very well see him as a relocation threat, and be able to take advantage after deliveries in that sense from Kevin Love and Larry Nance Jr., in particular, a fair amount.

Along with the off screen element, Sexton continuing to progress as a cutter will only aid him more and more as an overall scorer and ideally, secondary playmaker.

Doing so would have a lasting effect, as Sexton would be keyed in on even more by opposing defenses, which could aid those on the floor with him, such as Garland, Love, KPJ, feasibly Andre Drummond, Nance and the now-mostly healthy Dylan Windler.

For his own case, though, Sexton did show growth in that cutting area again as the now-past season wore on, and if Collin can continue that trend, with him improving as a finisher in year 2 and being bigger and stronger now, further cutting development could lead to easy looks for him more moving forward.

I’d expect Sexton to be able to cash in on his spot-up shooting viability now more in coming years, and he should be able to get his share of high percentage shots from quick floaters, mid-range looks and perhaps even dunks via cuts. That could come from defenders wanting to prevent spot-ups for him, from my perspective.

Moreover, while I completely acknowledge Collin Sexton will be filling it up in the unassisted variety, further off-ball growth for him would truly have a lasting effect for his own game and help open up other Cleveland Cavaliers teammates in the process.