Cavaliers Links Roundup: What the playoffs mean for Cleveland, Jarrett Jack's brighter future, and more

The NBA playoffs are in full swing, and they've been incredibly entertaining, even though the Cleveland Cavaliers are obviously not participating in them. But there's still plenty of stuff to discuss as we head into a very interesting summer.

Speaking of the playoffs, Kevin Hetrick over at Cavs: the blog has some observations about what's happened so far and what it all means for the Cavs:

"In his fourth season, paired with a fellow top-five pick, guard running mate, John Wall made the playoffs. Next year is Kyrie's fourth season. Certainly, he and Wall, nor Waiters and Beal are entirely similar, but it is encouraging seeing the leaps that a young, offensive minded back-court can make early in their careers."

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At Right Down Euclid, Trevor Magnotti has a post about Jarrett Jack that's actually somewhat optimistic:

"Jack attempted to force things too much, didn't seem to understand his role or the offensive game plan, and clearly did not mesh with Irving on the floor. Jack's shooting totals free fell, his PER dropped from a respectable 15.9 to 11.5, and he was often more of a detriment than a help to the team this season. If that's what we can expect from Jack for the next two years, there's reason to panic. To expect that Jack would stay at that level of production, however, probably isn't realistic."

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Draft coverage probably won't really get going until after the lottery, but Wade Foley of More Than A Fan: Cleveland took an early look at five prospects who will likely still be available after the first eight picks.

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In her mailbag, Mary Schmitt Boyer basically said that she has no idea when or how Dan Gilbert will decide the respective fates of Mike Brown and David Griffin. She also speculated that the Cavs could be interested in Carlos Boozer (?!?!), if he is amnestied.

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And finally, the NBA announced that Michael Carter-Williams won this season's Rookie of the Year. Sadly, Matthew Dellavedova did not get a single vote. That may not be surprising, until you consider that Giannis Antetokounmpo, Nick Calathes, and Steven Adams all did get one third-place vote. You can see the full results here.

{Editor's note: We're thrilled to add Mike Mayer to the writing staff at Fear the Sword. He's going to be doing lots of different stuff for us and it's going to be awesome. Prior to joining us here, he wrote at RebuildingSince1964.com. You should follow him on Twitter at @RS64MikeMayer. Give him a nice warm welcome full of random GIFs because that's how things work here.}

Here's how excited I am to introduce Mike Mayer today: