Cavs: Dylan Windler’s won’t be a typical first-year player situation

Dylan Windler could bring instant offense for the Cleveland Cavaliers.

Next season, I’d expect Dylan Windler to make his presence felt on the floor for the Cleveland Cavaliers. Windler didn’t appear at all in 2019-20 due to a stress fracture in his left leg, but he participated in the Cavs voluntary in-market bubble team workouts in late September and seemingly made quite a splash.

I firmly believe that Windler should be just fine next season, health-wise, and feasibly as a key bench contributor, he should be an impact player. Windler is a polished all-around shooter, and has big-time range.

Windler hit 40.6 percent of 534 career three-point attempts in a four-year collegiate career at Belmont, and he should bring real pop in his minutes-share with his ability to light it up in a variety of ways via shooting off-the-catch/off movement and via the pull-up game.

Windler’s a really heady player overall as well, has great feel off the ball, is a timely cutter and high level finisher, and can help Darius Garland, Kevin Porter Jr. and Cleveland in the secondary playmaking realm. All things considered, Windler should aid the Cavs even early on, from my perspective.

The Cavs’ situation Windler won’t be a typical first-year player one.

Simply put, Windler will have some rust early on; that’s to be expected. But as opposed to a rookie situation for Darius Garland and/or Kevin Porter Jr., his fellow Cavs 2019 draft class brethren that were much younger, Windler is set to be 24 in basically his first season.

Now clearly I wouldn’t want Cleveland to initially look to draft a player that’s that age, really. Albeit in this case, it’s not like Windler, the prior #26 pick by Cleveland, is a prospect this season that’s set to be in consideration at #5, nor was then.

Anyway, for Windler, though, it’s again evident that his situation won’t be a typical first-year player one, and I believe the way Windler is such an adept mover without the ball, shooter and heady player, should lead to him adjusting pretty quickly.

And frankly, I could very well foresee Windler, even fairly early on next season, be an instant offense-type contributor. That’s due to his range, quick release, solid handle and his overall touch.

Him placing in the 94th percentile in halfcourt catch-and-shoot jumpers, 85th percentile in halfcourt pull-up situations and in the 96th percentile in halfcourt shots around the rim, per Synergy Sports and as h/t NBA.com, plays into that take, too.

So even while I honestly wouldn’t imagine Windler will end up being a starter in his first season, especially because the Cavs could draft all-around wings such as Deni Avdija or Isaac Okoro, Dylan should certainly make an impact. That’s in minutes-share at the 2 and 3, one would assume.

Though Windler will take a bit to get his legs under him/acclimated, I believe pretty early on, he should help the Cleveland Cavaliers’ perimeter efforts/as a ball-mover and cutter.

Plus, more and more as the year progresses, the Belmont product should be a quality grab-and-go threat, and let’s not discount him averaging 7.8 boards per outing in his collegiate career, either.

Circling back, I want the Cavs to go with a young prospect and/or focus on upside with a high pick in the 2020 NBA Draft, and I firmly believe the likes of Okoro, Avdija and/or Onyeka Okongwu would make their presences’ felt for Cleveland.

I don’t want to downplay that, either, but regarding the first-year situation with Windler, seemingly in a bench role, it will be nice to know in that way that Windler won’t have a typical first-player scenario.

And him being around the organization/teammates such as Kevin Love, Garland, Collin Sexton and Porter for a solid chunk of time already shouldn’t hurt in him being able to come in and make a difference in year 1.

That’s just even more of why I’m so excited to see Windler ball for the Wine and Gold.