Cavs bubble has to have helped Larry Nance Jr.’s leadership efforts

Larry Nance Jr. is one of the Cleveland Cavaliers best overall players, and he seems to be an emerging leader for them, too.

There’s not much to not like about Cleveland Cavaliers big Larry Nance Jr., who has continued to add to his game in the past two seasons.

Nance is again fresh off averaging a career-best in scoring with 10.1 points per outing in 2019-20, and his growth as a spot-up threat over the past two seasons has been a pleasure to watch.

During this now-past season for Cleveland, Nance hit 35.2 percent of his 2.8 three-point attempts per contest, and looking onward, a much-improved handle should only make him more capable as a secondary playmaker.

Nance is clearly one of the Cavs’ best defenders as well, and based on recent comments from J.B. Bickerstaff, it would appear that we’ll see Nance more at the 3 in some stretches next season. I’m on-board with that, too, with Nance’s development over the past two seasons.

Anyhow, when it comes to Nance, it’s becoming more clear that he’s going to be one of the Cavaliers’ key leaders looking onward, also.

The Cleveland Cavaliers in-market bubble team workouts has to have helped in that realm for Nance as well.

The Cavaliers recently wrapped up their in-market bubble team workouts earlier this past week, and while of course Kevin Love being in there for some of it, both on and off the floor, I’m sure that only aided Nance from a leadership standpoint, too.

Jordan Bell, who albeit may or may not stick around with Cleveland with his deal non-guaranteed starting next season, recently touched on how the Cavaliers team workouts, and team bonding activities off them, helped the team dynamic.

The squad went to Top Golf, had their share of team dinners and were around each other on and off the floor, which given team restrictions they’ve had due to novel coronavirus concerns, was seemingly invaluable.

To me, again, though, even more so for Nance, these team workouts, both from an on and off-floor perspective, had to have helped his leadership efforts. This season, with how Tristan Thompson may or may not be back with him expiring, and the same for Matthew Dellavedova, for instance, Nance could very well have an expanded leadership role.

And these workouts likely aided him in that regard, with Nance being an ever-improving player, and he seemingly growing in that way and aiding the likes of Darius Garland, Collin Sexton and Kevin Porter Jr., among others, too.

An exchange near the end of this clip during Cleveland Cavaliers scrimmaging with Dean Wade, who may or may not eventually stick around with his deal non-guaranteed beginning next season, also was along those lines with Nance acknowledging Wade making a nice play. That was even more so after he was defending Wade, and in turn, showing him love for it, in my opinion.

Moreover, you can tell that Nance is definitely “one of the guys” among the Cavaliers players. And he’s a player that seems to be both really close with the youngsters, such as Garland/KPJ, but at the same time, is seen as a veteran on and off-floor key presence for young guys to go to.

And it’s not to say that Love, for example, isn’t that way, and him being at least in the bubble for some of it paid dividends for the group/the coaching staff.

Again, for Larry Nance Jr., though, with him being a full participant in these voluntary team workouts, and being around the guys off the floor in regards to team bonding, has to have helped him forge relationships more with others, and continue to come on more as a key leader.

For Nance going into his third full season with the Cleveland Cavaliers, him stepping up more in that way I’m sure in that way will be great for the Wine and Gold moving forward, too.