Reason #1: Garland’s been able to work on his game extensively
Coming into his first season, Garland didn’t seemingly get to work on his game much, whereas he was mostly rehabbing from that meniscus injury. And the aforementioned foot injury coming into his first season dating back to training camp didn’t help his cause.
Coming into year 2, it’s obviously not been ideal to have not been able to have much team scrimmaging/team practices to this point due to COVID-19 restrictions. I’m not discounting that, and we’ll still inevitably see some rust from Garland and others, that’s understandable with how Cleveland hasn’t played in game action since March 10.
But it was refreshing to know that Garland seemingly looked great in the Cavs voluntary in-market bubble team workouts and in scrimmaging, really, as KJG’s Grant Puskar demonstrated.
Reports from that indicated how Garland looked “shiftier” then, as Puskar noted, and to me, with Garland coming into next year 100 percent and having been able to work on his individual game extensively, that will carry over into year 2 and he’ll play with so much more confidence.
That’s particularly in the scoring sense, and while we saw him largely more decisive as a shooter as the season progressed, I believe we’ll see that much more consistently game-to-game next season with him having been able to sharpen up his game individually over what’s been an extended offseason.
While again rust will be there for the Cavs early on with the long layoff, for young pieces, and Garland, even more so, this extended offseason will end up being invaluable for them individually for being more well-rounded on-ball.
I firmly believe that, and we should see Garland, fully healthy, ready to roll and be more assertive in year 2 as a scorer, and in the pick-and-roll I’d imagine. That last bit we’ll further stress next.