Darius Garland’s breakout season, and how it impacts the Cavs’ future

Should there be concerns about his size?

Garland is limited by his size at just 6-foot-1 and 192 lbs. He’s still only 21 years old, so he’s likely far from a finished product physically, but his lack of size can be exploited at this early stage in his career.

Offensively, I’m not too worried about it. He has enough skill and craft to play against anyone. That being said, you could point to their recent game against the Bucks as a red flag if you want to be critical. Jrue Holiday guarded him for most of that game and his physicality seemed to really take Garland out of the game.

But you know who else has struggled to handle Jrue Holiday’s physicality? Every single person that he’s ever guarded. It would be far more surprising if Garland was torching Holiday than it is that Holiday held him to a 3-12 shooting night.

Defensively is where most people probably have questions about Garland’s size, and to some degree, rightfully so. His size alone makes him an obvious target for opposing offenses, especially in a potential playoff series.

But Garland is far from a lost cause on that end of the floor. A lot of defense is being smart, which Garland is. And another big part of it is having a high give-a-crap factor, which I don’t think Garland gets enough credit for.

He may be small, but he moves his feet well and I think generally takes pride in playing solid defense:

That being said, just because he can hold his own in on-ball defense doesn’t mean he won’t get picked on. The playoffs often morph into a competition in which a team can hunt the other team’s worst defender and Garland would be the betting favorite to be the Cavs’ most hunted defender.

Their game against Milwaukee was a good example of that. The Bucks knew that the Cavs didn’t want Garland to switch onto Jrue Holiday, so they brought his man (Pat Connaughton) into the action to set screens and flare out for open threes, which they were able to get a couple of times towards the end of the first half:

Milwaukee went back to targeting Garland again at the end of the game, this time creating a few possessions where they were able to force Garland onto Khris Middleton, a matchup they’d love to get every time down the floor:

So yes, Garland can be attacked on defense and probably will in any meaningful game that the Cavs play in. But teams have been trying to pick on Garland during a lot of games this season and the Cavs are still 4th in the NBA in defensive efficiency. I think they’ll be fine.