Last season, Lamar Stevens looked to have turned a corner for the Cleveland Cavaliers. He showed flashes as a rookie as a multi-positional defender and on-ball presence, and in his second season in 2021-22, he benefited from having more meaningful opportunities.
The counting stats didn’t leap off the web page at 6.1 points and 2.6 rebounds per outing, and him hitting 27.7 percent of his three-point attempts was far from lighting it up from range. Point being, he wasn’t the most noteworthy offensive contributor last season for the Cavaliers, so his play may have been somewhat overlooked.
But, to Stevens’ credit, when the chances were there, he made his presence felt in a rotational sense defensively versus opposing forwards at various points last season, and in some spot starts, aided the team on both ends.
With him making plays on a number of occasions in 2021-22, and with him being able to play multiple positions for Cleveland, I’d have thought we’d have seen Stevens get some action at this juncture in his third year with the team. That hasn’t played out, though.
Through 12 games in the 2022-23 campaign, Stevens has only appeared in three contests for the Cavaliers, and he’s played 23 total minutes. The Cavs have to get that changed in upcoming games, given how he can provide energy in bench minutes, and function as playable depth.
Stevens needs to be getting minutes for the Cavaliers, for three reasons, of which we’ll emphasize here.
The first has to do with how he can help the team as a big wing defender for stretches.