The likelihood of Cavs’ Darius Garland, Jarrett Allen making All-Star Team

What’s the likelihood of Darius Garland making the All-Star Game?

Throughout the offseason, the talk of the town in Cleveland was the expected jump that Darius Garland was to make in his play. Over the years, Garland has gotten high recognition from both players and the media for his ability to shoot from distance and facilitate at a high level. Combine that with his incredible handle and you have a unique guard that could take this team to new heights.

To start this season, Garland hasn’t disappointed. With the unfortunate injury to Collin Sexton, Garland saw an uptick in his offensive opportunities and has made the most out of them. During this four-game dominance that the Cavs have displayed, Garland has averaged 23 points and 9.3 assists per game, shooting 54.7 percent from the field and 54.2 percent from deep on six attempts per game. This stretch includes a 32-point, 10-assist, 8-rebound outing against the Washington Wizards, showing once again how special he is, as KJG’s Robbie DiPaola hit on.

Looking at his season stats as a whole, on the year he is averaging 19.1 points and 7.3 assists per game on 46.7/37.8/86.3 shooting splits. Looking at these stats compared to his peers, Garland is just one of eight players in the NBA averaging at least 19 points and 7 assists per game, per NBA.com. The other six include multi-time All-Stars and All-NBA players and LaMelo Ball, who is in competition with Garland in making his first All-Star game this season.

Looking at the running list of things it takes to make an All-Star team, Garland has the media attention with the Cavs playing winning basketball, his individual success is comparable to the top guards in the league, and he has gotten high praise and recognition from the NBA’s top players.

Next, looking at the likelihood of Garland making an All-Star team, we have to look at his competition.

The NBA All-Star game consists of 24 players with 10 starters and 14 reserves from each conference. The starters include two backcourt players and three frontcourt players. The reserve unit has the same format and then two “wildcard” spots, meaning two more spots for top players from their respective conference. So with that let’s get into Garland’s competition.

Looking at the Eastern Conference once more, the starting guards are expected to be two of James Harden, Trae Young, Bradley Beal, and Zach LaVine. From there, things get interesting.

Off the bench, the other two that don’t make it look to be the first two guards off the bench. Looking at Wild Cards, with guys like Jimmy Butler, Jaylen Brown, Jayson Tatum, and DeMar DeRozan having the frontcourt classification, they may occupy those spots instead of a guard spot. For the wild card spots, Garland’s competition as of now looks to be guys like LaMelo Ball, Domantas Sabonis, Nikola Vucevic, and Khris Middleton, to name a few.

There’s also the potential for guys like Fred VanVleet, Kyle Lowry, and even his own teammate Jarrett Allen, who we’ll get to in a few, to grab a wild card spot.

Essentially, the path for Garland to become an All-Star seems to be either being voted in by the coaches or being an injury replacement.

Similar to what KJG’s own Will Holtz discussed in an article about Garland, I too believe that  Garland can be an All-Star this season as long as his scoring production stays up and the Cavaliers continue to win, but it will be tough.