As Cleveland Cavaliers fans are well aware of at this juncture, Dylan Windler hasn’t been able to stay healthy in his time with the club. Through two seasons, Windler has often been sidelined.
His first season was wiped out because of complications involved with a stress reaction in his lower left leg, and last season, he was active in just 31 games because of injuries.
His season was eventually concluded early in late April due to left knee surgery to address “ongoing patella tendinopathy concerns,” along with that, and at the time, it was reportedly expected that Windler would miss the next Summer League as well.
To that point, as was not surprising, Windler was ruled out of Las Vegas Summer League, per Chris Fedor of Cleveland.com on Sunday. Fedor stated in his report how the Cavaliers are exercising precaution here, and Windler is “starting to get healthy” after the surgery but wants him good to go for training camp.
#Cavs Dylan Windler will not be on the team’s Summer League roster in Las Vegas, sources tell @clevelanddotcom. Windler is starting to get healthy after left knee surgery but team is being cautious, wanting to make sure he’s right for training camp.
— Chris Fedor (@ChrisFedor) August 1, 2021
This news regarding Windler not being on the 2021 Cavs Summer League squad is no big deal.
Considering that Windler is still recovering from his left knee surgery, there was no need to push things for Summer League. Windler again appeared in 31 games last season and has had trouble staying available for the Cavaliers in his first two seasons, and there’s simply no need to rush him back, even with Summer League reps being meaningful.
Windler did show flashes as a catch-and-shoot threat last season for the Cavaliers, and if he can be mostly healthy, could provide a quality movement shooter for Darius Garland, Collin Sexton and others to target in minutes off the bench. He wasn’t able to firmly establish a consistent rhythm in what was his de facto rookie campaign last season though, as evidenced by a fairly underwhelming 33.8 percent hit rate from three.
On a positive note, Windler’s finishing as a cutter was a bright spot for him, to go along with his team defense and rebounding; he had 7.5 boards per-36 minutes in 2020-21.
Granted, some playing time in the Summer League in Vegas from Aug. 8-17 could’ve aided Windler, one would’ve thought, but as Fedor alluded to, the Cavs are being cautious. As many have stressed relating to Dylan, who has had such rough injury luck and is on the thinner side either way, that’s the right call, even with some reps potentially helping him get some confidence.
A few others that could be players to watch in Summer League for the Cavs however, are the likes of Isaac Okoro, who has been seemingly living in the gym this offseason, Brodric Thomas and #3 overall pick Evan Mobley. And it should be fun to see how recent undrafted Exhibit 10 signing Chandler Vaudrin does.
The 6-foot-7 Vaudrin could be a long term play as a jumbo playmaking presence for down the road. We’ll have to see in terms of the other crucial potential contributors on the squad, which should be revealed reportedly early this week.
Anyway, circling back, although it could’ve provided some help for Windler to get some into rhythm before training camp via exhibition offseason reps, even with him not typically being the kind of player getting Summer League reps, this news isn’t a big deal.
Hopefully from the Cavs and Windler’s perspective, he can get himself right leading into camp by late September, and perhaps can be a viable bench contributor on the wing off the bench as a shooting/depth piece next season.
That remains to be seen, but the potential is there, as Windler did hit 40.6 percent from three in a four-year collegiate career at Belmont.