The 2022-23 Cleveland Cavaliers season is almost upon us, with the squad set to begin their campaign on Oct. 19 at the Toronto Raptors. Cleveland has three preseason games left on this upcoming Monday, Wednesday and Friday versus the Philadelphia 76ers and Atlanta Hawks, and then they’ll wrap up that slate at the Orlando Magic.
The Cavaliers didn’t get the W in Philly on Wednesday in a 113-112 loss, but it was a promising performance, and a number of guys got in on the act, and it was a contest the group can assuredly build on.
This season, the Wine and Gold will look to keep improving after a 2021-22 campaign where the team amassed 44 wins, their most in a season without LeBron James on the roster since 1998.
The Cavs eventually lost in the Play-In Tournament, which was a bit disappointing, although with the injuries Cleveland dealt with last season, the year overall was an encouraging one for Darius Garland and company. This arrow for this still largely young Cleveland team is definitely pointing up, too, and trade acquisition Donovan Mitchell, a three-time All-Star in five seasons with the Utah Jazz, is one of the reasons for that.
Now, here, with the 2022-23 campaign nearly underway for the Cavs, who were often at their best last season when the ball was hopping around, mixed in with quality shot creation, coupled with that, I figured I’d highlight Cleveland’s top passers.
Along those lines, let’s take a closer look at the Cavs’ three best passers ahead of the upcoming season.
To begin, I figured I’d give two guys honorable mentions, which we’ll consider tied for the fourth on this list.
The Cavs’ honorable mention: Kevin Love
Before getting into the top three passers, I had to shoutout Kevin Love first, and while I didn’t ultimately select him here, Evan Mobley nearly made the cut for that.
Love had 2.2 assists per contest last season, which didn’t equate to gaudy playmaking splits, but he’s a high-level passing big, and should once again make a positive impact for Cleveland’s ball movement throughout games this year.
Throughout Love’s tenure with the Cavaliers, he’s been a very productive secondary playmaking presence, and does a quality job of hitting touchdown passes to guys down the floor for early offense after defensive rebounds. He’s not the hub he used to be, however, he’s still a really effective passer.
His signature outlet feeds always ignites the crowd, and with him this season set to be further acclimated to a key bench role, I’d still expect him to help initiate good ball-swings to counter his shooting presence, and he does a quality job of hitting cutters. His mid-post feel can still lead to great looks for other shooters on the weak side when double teams come as well.
Furthemore, regarding the playmaking feel of Love, he placed in the 82nd percentile in assist rate among bigs last season, per Cleaning The Glass.
The 3 best Cavs’ passers entering 2022-23 – No. 3: Donovan Mitchell
For the third-best passer heading into this season, I’m going with Donovan Mitchell.
Over the course of his five years with the Utah Jazz, Mitchell got progressively better as a playmaker for others, particularly when it came to perimeter shooters.
Mitchell is going to be a score-first guy, and he projects as the primary bucket-getter for the Cavaliers now, but Mitchell will reportedly be getting functioning as a lead guard for some stretches in non-Garland lineups, and he’s capable there.
Over the years, Mitchell has become especially adept at a variety of deliveries with his drive-and-kick game to counter his scoring, and that should hold true in coming years with Cleveland. Mitchell in a combo guard role has had 4.3, and then 5.2 and 5.3 assists per game the last three seasons, and with help from Garland, his turnover splits should go down, in my opinion.
Mitchell can make feeds with both hands in those situations, hit spray-outs over-the-top in pick-and-roll to the weak side corner on a line if double teams come, and on baseline drives, he can contort his body in mid-air to hit shooters from a variety of angles. That can negate rotations, en route to more open looks for others.
Objectively, I didn’t read a ton into the Mitchell not dishing to Rudy Gobert often stuff, and I personally do think Mitchell will be just fine in helping generate quality looks for Evan Mobley and Jarrett Allen. And for what it’s worth, Allen is a far more polished offensive player than Gobert, and just has far better touch, so I’d think we should see Mitchell-Allen pick-and-roll sequences lead to quality offense for both.
Mitchell can have blinders on at times, and for score-first guards, that can happen occasionally, so somewhat along the lines of Collin Sexton, I’m going to give Mitchell a pass. I do with Sexton before, too, and his passing improved over his time with the Cavs.
But in the case with Mitchell here, his vision and creativity is far more advanced with how that was developed with Utah. And with Mitchell’s terrific ball-handling factored in as well, he should make a big impact as a passer for the Cavaliers, too, coupled with his scoring.
The 3 best Cavs’ passers entering 2022-23 – No. 2: Darius Garland
As for the Cavs’ second-best passer heading into this season, I have to go with Darius Garland.
Garland is one of the league’s best emerging guards, fresh off of a breakout campaign in 2021-22, in which he made his first All-Star Game and had 21.7 points and 8.6 assists per outing. That followed up a promising second year, when he had 17.4 points and 6.1 assists per game.
Garland has really started to come into his own as a pick-and-roll maestro, and this season, we should again see him and Jarrett Allen thrive in playing off one another. The lobs and pocket dishes he can make to Allen often leads to quality offense for Cleveland, and this year, I’d expect Garland to be able to find perimeter shooters more with the threat posed by his connection with Allen in that realm.
Garland also is fully capable of making wrap-around feeds from keeping his dribble alive in breaking down opposing defenses, and his vision to hit skip dishes makes things easier for guys such as Kevin Love off-ball, too. I’d expect to see that pay off for Mitchell as well, and we saw glimpses of that element in Cleveland’s narrow loss to the 76ers on Wednesday, albeit in preseason.
Granted, hitting timely feeds to perimeter shooters with more volume could be an area where Garland can be more consistent, but there have been tons of instances where he delivered those on-time and right to the shooting pocket of his teammates in the past two seasons.
Heading into his fourth year, he’ll continue to get better at that, and the threat Mitchell poses will only open up more passing lanes for Garland to hit those feeds, and where he can from a variety of different angles and launch points. Garland does need to cut down some on turnovers in those sequences, but with more help around him this season, and with more experience, I don’t view that as being much of a concern looking onward.
And lastly, this year, I’d expect to see Garland push tempo some more, and I’d think we should see more hit-ahead passes from him to players such as Isaac Okoro and Caris LeVert, among others.
The 3 best Cavs’ passers entering 2022-23 – No. 1: Ricky Rubio
For the top Cavaliers’ passer heading into the 2022-23 campaign, I have to go with Ricky Rubio here.
To get this out of the way, it’s not a certainty as to when we could see Rubio back in action for the Wine and Gold. He’s progressing in his recovery from a torn ACL in his left knee from last December, and while that was the second ACL tear in that left knee for him, if he can keep recovering steadily, he could seemingly be back for the season’s second half, feasibly. Perhaps we could see him back in December.
Upon his return, he could still make a big impact for the Cavaliers this season in a supersub-type role once again, of which he was mostly in in his 34 appearances following his trade acquisition last offseason from the Minnesota Timberwolves.
Simply put, Rubio has long been one of the NBA’s best passers, as he demonstrated in his two stints with Minnesota, the first of which he played plenty with Love, and at his other stops with the Jazz and Phoenix Suns, Rubio did so as well.
For his career, Rubio has had 7.6 assists per contest, and in his 34 appearances last year with Cleveland pre-injury, he had 6.6 helpers per game in mostly a supersub role. It was understandable why the Cavaliers reunited with Rubio this offseason, even with the injury and after his then-expiring contract was moved in the Caris LeVert trade involving the Indiana Pacers last season.
Rubio’s creativity as a passer allows rollers to always be in-play, for one. His pick-and-pop feel, especially in sequences with Love, can give the Cavaliers quite a lift upon his return, too, to counter his lob dishes to other bigs.
Along with the interior passing and pick-and-roll vision aiding the interior, Rubio’s dimes thrown in the transition game brought a new element to the Cavs’ offense last year in various lineups, and in secondary break situations, his timing for hitting trailers is so impressive.
And in set offense, his ambidextrous hook passing in firing to the perimeter puts defenders in a bind, and his ability to manipulate rotators with ball fakes, behind-the-back feeds to cutters and shooters leads to incredible opportunities for other Cavaliers.
With the body of work, vision, creativity and his impeccable timing, I have to go with Rubio as Cleveland’s top passer heading into this season. Garland is a close second, but not having Rubio there would be a sizeable slight to him. Through 11 seasons, Rubio having a 7.6-to-2.6 assist-to-turnover ratio is pretty damn solid, too.