ON THE THIRD day of coaching camp, the Cleveland Cavaliers took a break from the basketball courtroom. It was Oct. 2, a damp, 87-degree afternoon in Bradenton, Florida, the place the Cavs have been internet hosting camp at IMG Academy, a multisport facility that coach Kenny Atkinson in comparison with an Olympic village.
Atkinson aimed to create a coaching camp that centered on greater than basketball, breaking apart the monotony that may kind throughout an extended season and giving the Cavs an opportunity to kind bonds they may depend on all through the season.
And so it was that he took the workforce onto the monitor within the afternoon for a cardio-focused exercise. It was proper close to the baseball subject.
Jaylon Tyson, the second-year guard who has been thrust into the beginning lineup attributable to accidents, challenged the workforce’s star, Donovan Mitchell, to satisfy him on the diamond, guaranteeing he might get successful off him.
The whole workforce joined them.
Mitchell took the mound. His father, Donovan Sr., performed baseball within the minors and has labored with the Mets for the previous twenty years, and he handed down a love for the sport to his son. Mitchell performed baseball via highschool and insists he might have performed professionally.
Tyson, after a couple of whiffs, lastly made contact, a foul tip, nevertheless it shortly become a full workforce batting observe.
Along with his baseball background, Mitchell was the one participant the workforce trusted to pitch. When it was Mitchell’s flip to hit, and a few members of IMG Academy accessible to toss, the Cavs star cranked a pair of dwelling runs — the Cavs’ model of Shohei Ohtani, at the least amongst a bunch of hoopers.
“Simply displaying off a little bit bit,” Mitchell informed ESPN. “Exhibiting what I might do.”
Mitchell is in his fourth season of displaying what he can do for the Cavs. It is also 12 months 4 for the vaunted core of Mitchell, Evan Mobley, Jarrett Allen and Darius Garland, a quartet that has remodeled the Cavs into contenders once more within the Japanese Convention.
However Mitchell has nonetheless by no means performed within the convention finals because the Cavs have fallen quick within the playoffs the previous two seasons, dropping within the semifinals.
In 2024, they fell in 5 video games to the Boston Celtics, who went on to win the NBA championship. The Cavs fired their coach, J.B. Bickerstaff, that summer time and employed Atkinson.
In Atkinson’s first season, a 64-win blitz via the common season and a sweep of the Miami Warmth within the first spherical of the playoffs had Cleveland fascinated with a return to the Finals. However then the Cavs have been dispatched, once more in Spherical 2, a five-game trouncing by the Indiana Pacers because the Cavs’ lineup was hampered by accidents to Garland, Mobley and De’Andre Hunter.
This was a distinct kind of monotony — not one thing a scheduling tweak might clear up.
HUNTER REPLAYED THAT collection in his thoughts all summer time, watching hours of tape to determine points to handle, holes to fill. He skipped movie of the win however zeroed in on the losses.
He got here to a revealing, however maybe unsatisfying, conclusion.
“It was extra psychological than something,” Hunter informed ESPN. “Sport 1, that is the sport we’re imagined to win. We win that recreation and the collection is totally completely different. We simply form of have been mentally weak, at occasions, and so they have been mentally stronger.”
The Pacers had jumped out to an early 11-point lead on Cleveland’s dwelling ground in Sport 1, then closed the fourth quarter on a 20-10 run for the win.
“I do not assume it was something bodily. I do not assume it was any talent hole,” Hunter continued. “I actually simply assume it was all psychological.”
As soon as once more, Cleveland started the season as the favourite, per ESPN BET, to win the Japanese Convention and had third-best odds to deliver dwelling the Larry O’Brien trophy — increased expectations than any 12 months since LeBron James’ final season with the workforce in 2017-18.
So Cleveland is doubling down on final season’s edict — that third-year large man Evan Mobley must be the middle of its operation.
The Cavs achieved their most profitable common season in a decade final season by relying much less on Mitchell and extra on Mobley. And maybe for good cause.
In the course of the previous two postseasons, Mitchell has put up 11 30-point video games; the Cavs are simply 5-6 in these video games.
For the workforce to get to the convention finals, the Cavs acknowledge they should rely much less on Mitchell as their Ohtani-like everyman; create a extra dynamic and various offense, with new position gamers Hunter and Lonzo Ball including to an already stable ecosystem; and provides Mobley much more duty.
The Cavs are 4-3 thus far — a relatively inauspicious begin; they did not lose their third recreation final season till Nov. 29. Their protection stays within the high 10, however their offense ranks twenty sixth within the league.
“These small exams may also help us for the playoffs,” Hunter stated. “We bought an extended season, and there is a variety of exams inside that journey. We endure these exams, that’ll get us prepared. And, truthfully, dropping like that within the playoffs, whether or not it is an entire 12 months later or not, it prepares you for that subsequent time you face that adversity.”
Mitchell additionally sees progress within the early regression. After racing via final common season, he stated, their activity this season can be to make sure they’re in a greater place to achieve the playoffs.
“Habits, man. You do not simply determine it out,” Mitchell stated. “We nonetheless bought to construct. That is what this complete common season is about. You possibly can’t have a look at it and say simply wait till April, as a result of all of the stuff that you simply do in April, the muse is laid out all through the season.”
MITCHELL GOT WORD in mid-August that the Cavs could be down two starters to start the season.
Garland’s toe surgical procedure, after the top of the playoffs in June, was going to sideline him for the beginning of the season, after which Mitchell realized Max Strus wanted to restore a fracture in his left foot.
Mitchell had taken his personal break from basketball after the second disappointing playoff loss. He bought engaged to R&B singer Coco Jones in July. He dove deeper into his Mets fandom, becoming a member of New York shortstop Francisco Lindor for an hour sit-down on his podcast. The playoff loss stung, and he wished to clear his thoughts.
However then the information hit that along with being down two starters, the Cavs’ main bench scorer, Ty Jerome, signed with the Memphis Grizzlies in free company. Mitchell’s actual offseason started.
“Understanding that hey, this occurred and we f—ed up,” Mitchell informed ESPN. “Now it is like, ‘OK, how will we not f— up the following time?”
He quickly linked with Mobley.
Accidents performed a job within the consecutive playoff exits. Mitchell himself missed the ultimate two video games of the 2024 convention semifinals towards Boston. Within the collection towards the Pacers in 2025, Garland missed the primary two video games; Mobley and Hunter missed Sport 2; and Mitchell was hindered by an ankle damage by the top of the collection.
Mitchell is coming off a season by which he posted a 30.9% utilization price, his lowest since his rookie season in 2017-18. However in the course of the playoffs, partly due to the accidents round him, it skyrocketed to 37.2%, the best of any participant within the playoffs and one of many highest in his profession.
“Me and [Mobley] had a dialog, it was like, ‘Hey, final 12 months he took a step,'” Mitchell stated. “That is his first 12 months actually having the ball like that. Now it is like, ‘Hey, I am not open … it is you. That offense creation is coming from you. That is what we anticipate out of you.’ However with that comes nice duty, too.”
Mobley, 24, averaged profession highs in factors, subject objective makes an attempt, 3-pointers, and free throws final season, along with profitable Defensive Participant of the 12 months. It earned him an look within the All-Star Sport and his first All-NBA nod, however the Cavs nonetheless assume they’re solely tapping the floor together with his potential.
“He is dealing with the ball much more,” Atkinson stated. “He is bought to be a playmaker for us, and you are going to see a rise in utilization once more. However I would like that steadiness — between perimeter and getting him the ball inside and getting him the paint.”
Mobley’s utilization price is as much as 24.7% thus far this season, a marked enhance from the 23.2% he posted within the 2024-25 season. And he has taken on much more of the playmaking obligations. He is averaging a career-best 4.4 assists per recreation.
“I simply bought to maintain taking that on,” Mobley informed ESPN, “Taking the challenges.”
These challenges stay in query. After taking pictures 49.1% final season, the second-best mark within the league (behind Denver’s 50.6%), the Cavs have began this season taking pictures 44.5%, twenty fourth within the NBA. They’re making the identical variety of 3s, however they’re needing 4 extra shot makes an attempt per recreation to get there.
And Mitchell has scored 33.7% of the Cavs’ factors this season, the best in his four-year tenure in Cleveland, and he is creating lots of his personal photographs off the dribble. In response to ESPN Analysis, 81% of his made 2-pointers have been unassisted, and he is getting extra factors than ever from midrange, 13.6% of his factors in comparison with 9.9% final season.
“I haven’t got the precise reply for you proper now,” Mitchell stated earlier than the season. “That is going to should be a sense. Plenty of that, too, is the place [Evan’s] at or the place Dre’s at and simply being prepared for no matter comes.
“It is easy to say, ‘Oh, you form of revert again — however typically the scenario requires it. Individuals have been damage, it is not simply ‘f— it, right here I’m going.'”
It is why Mitchell has leaned so closely on Mobley, attempting to instill each the boldness and aggressiveness within the Cavs’ youngest star.
“I needed to discover that at his age early on once I first bought into the league,” Mitchell stated. “It is a course of. You are seeing him being aggressive, which we’ll take. Now it is like how am I being sensible with that as properly?
“I am in his ear nonstop. … ‘Hey, you are a menace, or there is a move right here, or cease passing the f—ing ball, there is not any manner participant X ought to be capable to guard you.’ He has it himself, not saying it is all me. It is reinforcing that.”
The Cavs additionally know {that a} reinforcement is on his manner.
Garland, nonetheless their greatest playmaker, is shut to creating his season debut, Atkinson stated final week. Garland went via coaching camp with the Cavs’ G League workforce and has totally recovered from his toe damage.
Ball, for his half, has already helped push the workforce’s Tenth-ranked tempo, and he has recorded at the least one steal in every of the previous 5 video games he has performed.
“[This team] actually has every thing you could need on this league,” Ball informed ESPN. “Particularly the way in which our bigs are actually. We have trendy bigs, so for me, it is simply coming in and doing my job.”
Contained in the group, although, the Cavs know their season hinges on that one younger, trendy large. They have been impressed by Mobley’s willingness to personal extra of the offense, along with anchoring the protection. They understand it is perhaps the important thing to a different deep playoff run.
“When you watch him this offseason, he is been locked in,” Cavs president Kolby Altman stated earlier than the beginning of the season. “He’s actually severe about taking that leap to being a top-five participant within the league. … He is grown, he is nonetheless 24 years outdated, however now he is changing into a grown man when it comes to his physique, his feelings.
“I feel he is able to take that subsequent step. I say it on a regular basis: As he goes, we go.”