Cedi Osman projects to be one of Cavs’ best cutters

Cleveland Cavaliers wing Cedi Osman moves without the ball well.

Frankly, it seems evident that Cedi Osman is not a long-term starting 3 answer for the Cleveland Cavaliers. Much of that has to do with his defensive limitations against starting-caliber wings, which is why Cleveland going with a wing in the upcoming draft would be reasonable.

Osman was largely underwhelming in the scoring sense last season, too. On-ball, Osman is clearly pretty limited at this point, aside from in pick-and-roll situations a bit when bigs are more so switched out on to him.

This isn’t to knock Osman, though, and looking onward, he still is a nice player to have, feasibly in a rotational role. Cedi hitting 38.3 percent of his three-point attempts in 2019-20 was great to see, too.

Cedi improving as a shooter from the perimeter, mostly off-the-catch, should help in the floor spacing sense, and it does aid him to some extent as a driver. Along with that, what still should be the case next season is that Osman’s one of Cleveland’s best cutters.

Osman projects to again be one of the Cavs’ best cutters.

Osman is a player that showed some positive signs in terms of shooting off movement, but what again is apparent is that when he’s on the floor, he should be one of Cleveland’s best cutting threats.

Osman moves without the ball really well, and hopefully, we’ll see players such as Darius Garland, Kevin Porter Jr., Kevin Love and Larry Nance Jr. find him cutting along the baseline and/or via diagonal cuts.

Love and Osman, to go with Nance, really, have a well-established rapport as passers to Cedi in that regard, and I’d expect that to be seen at times throughout games for the Wine and Gold once again. Their chemistry with him leads to good looks, which helps the offense and the overall movement.

Of Osman’s assisted field goals in 2019-20, Love had the most of those with 43, per NBA.com’s shooting data. Next year, too, though, while I’d imagine there’s a good shot Osman could be moved to more of a bench role, him and Garland will assuredly get their share of minutes together.

And in year 2 as teammates, Garland should seemingly get Osman, who times up his cuts among the best on the Cavs, plenty of high percentage shots in that way. And that’s generally more of the role you want Osman in, coupled with being a floor spacing presence.

The key here is in Cedi’s minutes-share, with him being one of the Cavs’ best cutters, that’s more so going forward how I’d anticipate him to be involved. That’s aside from him being an improving catch-and-shoot player from three-point range, which will likely be the majority of his looks, anyhow.

In any case, to get the best out of Cedi Osman when he is out there, the Cavaliers shouldn’t be expecting much on-ball creation from him. This isn’t to knock Osman, though, and to help draw some attention away from others such as Garland, Love and KPJ, Osman being a few cutting chances to counter his floor spacing could aid in getting him more in-rhythm and engaged.

Too often last season he seemed to disappear offensively, and while he won’t be a key on-ball player I wouldn’t think when he’s on the floor as much, the Cleveland Cavaliers need to hit Osman at times, too, and not just catch-and-shoots.

If he’s utilized in that way game-to-game, with Cedi being a highly capable passer as well, he could hit the likes of Nance, Andre Drummond, seemingly, and/or Dylan Windler potentially in some stretches on the floor with him for looks near the basket if help comes.

Moreover, looking at next season, with him being a heady player, Osman projects to be one of Cleveland’s best cutters still, feasibly along with Nance and Love, for instance. Windler could very well be in that conversation as next season progresses, too.

Anyway, hopefully Cedi gets rewarded for his timely cutting game-to-game periodically to counter his off-the-catch/at times, off movement shooting, and to aid in taking pressure off others, such as Sexton and KPJ.