2025 Cleveland Cavaliers Preseason Preview

Last season the Cavaliers finished with a record of 48 wins and 34 losses and lost to the Boston Celtics in the conference semi-finals. Headlined by a great defense - scoring was more of an issue in Cleveland and new head coach Kenny Atkinson looks to bring some of that with him from Golden State, where he was an assistant for the previous four years.

(AP Photo/David Zalubowski)

Donovan Mitchell has been the guy for Cleveland the past two years, having his two most efficient seasons since arriving from Utah. No player has emerged as a clear number two scorer, with Darius Garland, Jarrett Allen, and Evan Mobley trading off of that responsibility nightly. This has, at times, lead the offense without a clear directions, especially in the 27 games Mitchell missed last year.

One of the biggest questions for coach Atkinson is “Can Sam Merrill keep it up?”. The last pick in the 2020 draft shot .404 from behind the arch last year on 5.8 attempts per game. This was the 19th best percentage for a player with more than 5 attempts be game. Curiously, 18th on that list was Steph Curry (albeit on more than twice the volume). For a team that needs scoring and a coach who is used to systems with a lot of 3 point attempts; Merrill has an opportunity to emerge as an off the bench flamethrower if he can round out the rest of his game.

With Mobley and Mitchell agreeing to recent extensions, the time for Cleveland to win is now. They have a young team constructed so the core roster can be together for an extended period of time. Next season they will need to make some decisions of the margins to stay below the first apron, and Utah controls most of Clevelands draft for the foreseeable future. The Cavs do have 9 second round draft picks however, and they could use these to acquire serviceable role players to improve their current roster through trades, or add low cost contracts to keep below the thresholds.