Cavs: Emphasis on pull-up 3s early for Darius Garland is encouraging

Coming into this season, it was apparent that there was plenty of hype involving Darius Garland, and that was understandable. Garland had a bounce-back campaign, and a very good one I thought, last season for the Cleveland Cavaliers.

His handle, dazzling passing abilities, pick-and-roll play and shooting range were often on display, and it was a plus to see him rebound after a fairly underwhelming rookie year, which was that way because of a variety of factors.

So, heading into this season, it was evident that Garland seemed poised to take another leap, or at least a real step forward, also, and he very well could. He has started a bit slow, although it’s not 100 percent on him, clearly.

It was unfortunate that Garland sustained a left ankle sprain on a transition play in Cleveland’s season opener at the Memphis Grizzlies, a loss down the stretch, and Garland was sidelined for two games. Those were in an L versus the Charlotte Hornets and a win versus the Atlanta Hawks, for reference.

On a positive note, it does appear that Garland is getting himself on the right track and is far healthier again, as he returned in Cleveland’s win at the Denver Nuggets and was active in a W at the LA Clippers, too.

Anyway, while the overall production as a scorer has started on the lower end at 14.0 points per game, partly due to the injury it seems and with others involved, such as Lauri Markkanen, Evan Mobley and Ricky Rubio, Garland will be just fine.

His passing has been valuable as always, as evidenced by 9.0 assists per outing (to 4.3 turnovers, though), but when it comes to the scoring element, one thing, especially, has been promising for his outlook, from my perspective.

That’s regarding the pull-up game, particularly from three, early on; he had reportedly been working on extending his range over the offseason, too.

Cavs: The emphasis on pull-up threes early is encouraging for Garland.

To me, at first glance, it has seemed that at times, I’d like to see Garland go to pull-up threes a bit more, particularly in early offense, but overall, the results have been fine, and encouraging, really.

The Cavs were reportedly stressing as a team, to get up more threes this season, and for Garland and Collin Sexton, even more so it seemed, aside from Lauri Markkanen in that mold, too, obviously.

On the subject of the pull-up triples, though, it’s again been a positive takeaway, from the scoring sense, thus far from Garland.

Through four games in which he’s been active, he’s shot 36.0 percent from three, on 6.3 triple attempts per game overall, and we’ve seen him flash that step back game. But the pull-ups in that area to me have really been good to see, and they’ll make him so dangerous from beyond the arc.

It’s very early here, so it’s tough to read too much into it. However, Garland having eight pull-up attempts from deep, of which he’s hit three (a 37.5 percent clip), per NBA.com’s shooting data, has been a plus, to an extent.

He’s going to get some off-ball three-point looks still, and I’d like to see him utilized some off movement in that regard; in a general sense, though, the early willingness from him to take a few pull-up attempts per game has been good to see. That’s combined with the off-ball and step back game, which has been utilized a bit in pick-and-roll, for what it’s worth.

That approach from Garland is very encouraging, to drive it home, and as we get more into the meat of the season, I’d hope pull-up threes continue to seemingly be a point of emphasis for him.

We saw them some more post-All-Star break last season from DG, and I’d imagine those will pick up again, which could help Cleveland’s offense, which is having issues hitting triples in set offense to begin this season.

In fairness, I do believe we’ll see guys such as Lauri Markkanen, who is off to a tough start, but did have a good outing in a loss at the Los Angeles Lakers on Friday, to go with Sexton and Kevin Love, for example, hit more open looks from deep.

In any case, as we’ve hit on here, it’s been great to see Garland show more pull-up willingness from deep early on, as that will only open up more playmaking and penetration opportunities for him as gets more comfortable/healthy. Keep firing em, DG!