Cleveland Cavaliers draft: Moody could provide three-point shooting and flashed on-ball shot creation potential
As far as the other key seller for Moody, regarding the “3” part of the 3-and-D projection, the 6-foot-6 wing could aid Cleveland’s perimeter shooting efforts. He had a more than respectable 16.8 points and 5.8 rebounds per contest in 2020-21 with Arkansas.
Moody’s 35.8 percent clip from three with the Razorbacks didn’t necessarily blow doors off at first glance, but 37.6 percent of his 5.5 triple attempts per outing went down in SEC play. And while Moody did struggle mightily in six tournament games, combined with the SEC tourney and NCAA tourney, which led to the overall deep clip sliding a bit, he did still hit 38.6 percent from deep in 26 regular season games.
For the Cavaliers, Moody I believe could help floor spacing for guys such as Garland and Sexton, and for Jarrett Allen in pick-and-roll some, to go with Isaiah Hartenstein/Cedi Osman. Some bench lineups with Moody and Dylan Windler I could see being meaningful in that realm too, if Windler can get stroke down in-game/stay mostly healthy.
We’d again have to see as far as the minutes-share for Moody, though, but his off-ball shooting abilities, and him showing some viability as an off-movement shooter as he did at Arkansas could aid his case as the season progresses and he’s establishing consistency.
Now, I still would anticipate that from a continuity standpoint, that Moody would likely come off the bench if the Cavs selected him in the 2021 NBA Draft. Could he end up being a starter down the road? I can’t say for certain on that.
Either way, Moody I’d imagine could definitely help the Cavaliers’ perimeter shooting efforts, of which were not good enough last season clearly as a team, injuries aside.
That could seemingly lead to the Cavs being able to seek a trade for the to-be expiring Taurean Prince in that sense also and look to upgrade the backup point guard position. And Prince was rumored to be available near the deadline, along with Osman, for what it’s worth, too.
In any case, while he has a ways to go as a driver/finisher and needs to fill out a bit more I believe, which both play into why I wouldn’t honestly want Moody to start early on for Cleveland, he did show flashes of on-ball shot creation via pull-ups and touch in the paint.
So maybe in the near future there’s more there that will be seen from the 19-year-old, and perhaps for the Cavaliers.
We’ll have to see, but if Cleveland ended up drafting Moody, particularly in the 6-8 range, I’d be more than fine with that for his 3-and-D qualities.