Winners and Losers: Cavs vs Bulls – De’Andre Hunter has to be better

The Cleveland Cavaliers lost another one. At some point, hopefully soon, we’ll be able to write one of these after a win.

WINNER – Darius Garland gives us hope

I’ve written multiple times that nothing matters this season if Darius Garland can’t get healthy. At the time, I didn’t realize how bad things could get for the Cavs. I certainly didn’t expect them to be 15-14 at this point.

With that said, Garland’s health is still the most important thing. They don’t have a chance of turning things around and competing for a title if he isn’t on the court and contributing. While the other issues on this team have taken the spotlight — I can at least rest easy that Garland is trending in the right direction.

Garland had 35 points and 8 assists tonight. He shot above 44% for the first time all season. This was a spry and almost throwback performance from the two-time All-Star.

It still wasn’t perfect. Garland could have had 40+ points if he had made a few more bunnies. And, his defense is still leaving much to be desired. He was much more effective on that end of the floor last year, for example.

Nonetheless, a step in the right direction is worth noting. Garland finally showed that there’s some hope for him this season. Maybe he can turn the corner and be effective despite the toe injury. That’s worth something.

LOSER – De’Andre Hunter

This has become egregious.

There are too many things going wrong for the Cavs for us to blame any one particular person for everything. But Hunter is trying his hardest to change that. He’s been the single most damaging player on the floor for weeks. Almost all of Cleveland’s current issues, outside of injuries, can be traced back to Hunter.

Watch any of their defensive breakdowns when Hunter is on the court. You can almost guarantee that he’ll be lost or out of place on all of them. If he isn’t getting beaten by a backdoor cut, he’s watching the ball as an opponent scores an uncontested layup. He doesn’t help. He doesn’t contain his man.

And worst of all, it looks like he doesn’t even try.

Hunter has always been gifted enough as a scorer to compensate for some of his other shortcomings. But not this season. This year, he’s a sub 30% three-point shooter who is getting outworked on a nightly basis. Tunnel vision, inefficient shooting and poor defensive effort make for a disastrous combination.

We know for a fact that Hunter can be better than this. He showcased how he can fit into a team system last year. He was even impactful during the first few weeks of this season. But this is quickly getting out of hand — and something needs to change if Hunter doesn’t want to become the ultimate loser.