The Cleveland Cavaliers got hit with more disappointing injury news on Sunday evening, with the updates that Jarrett Allen will be out at least another week and Larry Nance Jr. will miss three weeks with a calf injury.

Now, the Cavaliers have their starting center and one of the key pieces of their frontcourt depth on the sidelines. With that, there are a few players that the Wine and Gold will rely on to pick up some of the slack while Allen and Nance are out.

Another week of Jarrett Allen out means more time for Evan Mobley to prove he has what it takes physically and mentally to be Cleveland’s full-time center.  

Allen will not have missed five of the team’s last six games. In that same span, Mobley is averaging 18.5 points and 10.1 rebounds while shooting 57 percent from the floor and 50 percent from the three on 12.2 shot attempts.

While Allen is out, the Cavaliers will need Mobley to be more dominant in the paint and be Cleveland’s key rim protector. 

The Cavaliers signed Thomas Bryant in the offseason for this exact scenario, one of Allen or Mobley being out for an extended time. Now, it’s time for the veteran center to prove why Cleveland believed in him.

With both Allen and Nance out, Bryant is next in line to get minutes behind Mobley as the team’s backup center.

In the three games Thomas has played this season in which he receives seven or more minutes, he’s averaging 3.25 points and 3.5 rebounds with a +/- of a positive 13. 

Dean Wade has had a fairly mediocre season up to this point. He’s never been a player who scores a ton of points, but has always been an efficient shooter. Wade is only averaging 5.3 points while shooting 30 percent from behind the arc.

One of the key players that Wade was battling for minutes with was Nance. Not only do the Cavaliers need Wade to step up with their frontcourt depth clearly thin, but the forward could also prove over the next month that he deserves to be the first backup big off the bench.