Cavs’ Darius Garland will continue to improve in the paint in 2022-23

Last season, we saw Darius Garland have a breakout campaign for the Cleveland Cavaliers. After a season where he showed marketed improvement as a facilitator, shooter and scorer in 2020-21 following an underwhelming rookie season, Garland took things up a notch in 2021-22.

After he had 17.4 points and 6.1 assists in his second year, Garland had 21.7 points and 8.6 assists per contest in his third year, and made it to the All-Star Game. That was the first of what could be a number of others to come for the foreseeable future for him, and it was nice to see Garland paired with Cavaliers teammate Jarrett Allen then with Team LeBron, particularly with Cleveland hosting.

Garland was huge for the Cavs in their resurgence last season, and going forward, he looks to be the primary catalyst for the Wine and Gold on offense. It was not shocking that the team and him agreed to a five-year, rookie max extension earlier this month, which kicks in starting in 2023-24.

The strides he’s taken over the past two seasons have been significant, and he should only get better from here as he gains more experience, gets more familiar with his teammates and keeps adding different tools to his skill set.

Along those lines, I thought it was also encouraging to see how Garland demonstrated further growth as a paint presence last season, after showing noticeable development the year prior. That only helps other areas of his game.

Garland will continue to improve as a paint presence with the Cavs in his fourth season ahead.

From a scoring perspective, Garland’s bread is going to be buttered by a steady dose of three-point looks via pull-ups, step backs and some from movement looks.

Some of it had to do with injuries to Collin Sexton, and a bit to Ricky Rubio, with the back half of the season in mind in that way, but Garland increased his three-point volume as the year went on. On the season, he had 6.7 attempts from deep per game, and knocked down 38.3 percent of those looks, and it’s evident that those attempts from off-the-bounce scenarios are going to be crucial for him, as they are for most, if not all, star lead guards in today’s NBA.

That said, I thought Garland was more of a factor in the paint last season, regardless of circumstances, and while deep balls and mid-range looks will be crucial for him as a scorer, of course, he should continue to get better as a paint player. Last season, he converted on 53.8 percent of his attempts from less than 10 feet, per NBA.com’s tracking data, on a 36.3 percent frequency, which is roughly the frequency I’d expect to see going forward.

He does still need to clean up some of the turnovers on drives, but it was good to see Garland appear to have more control with his change-of-pace even from the season prior, which led to Garland more effective at the rim with defenders in a bind.

His use of hesitations to counter his pull-ups, acceleration and also deceleration in secondary transition and his pick-and-roll play all factored into Garland improving his play further in the paint last season. He converted on 60.7 percent of his shot attempts at the rim, which was another positive step forward from the previous season, when he got better there. And I don’t discount that, especially with how he was dealing with a lower back injury for much of last season’s second half.

Now, I would imagine Garland’s driving volume should decrease next season a bit, with Caris LeVert in mind, Sexton if he’s back/possibly signed long-term (hopefully, to me), and a bit involving others, such as Ricky Rubio to come later.

Generally, though, as he’s refined his game more over time with Cleveland, and has made strides physically it seems, Garland has shown more viability in getting downhill in set offense and in secondary break plays, and that’s helped himself and his teammates.

In addition to the scoring element, Garland last season displayed better timing I thought with his pick-and-roll passing, both via lobs and some pocket feeds in the paint.

Plus, while it’s still needing of some polish there, which will happen with more experience as a playmaker, we did see Garland more on-point to sprayout feeds when defenses help on his drives, which aided Lauri Markkanen, Kevin Love and others. I’d think that should pay dividends for a shooter such as rookie Ochai Agbaji as the 2022-23 season progresses, too, and maybe the same for Sexton again.

So, next season, based on what we’ve seen last year, and as he’s gotten more seasoned in the past two seasons, Garland should continue to improve in the paint. And that will help the young leader, who turns 23 in January, in rounding out his game in years to come.