Hyland had a pretty successful rookie season in '21-'22 after being drafted 26th overall by the Nuggets in the 2021 draft. He averaged over 10 points per game on okay efficiency, and played over 1200 total minutes of non-garbage time. However, he fell out of favor in Denver during his second season, and was traded to the Clippers for very little in return. He wasn't in the Clippers' regular rotation in '23-'24, playing less than 450 minutes of non-garbage time across just 27 games, according to Cleaning the Glass. Scoring is Hyland's main skill, as he can really score at all levels. He has the deep 3 in his game, and has hit 37% of his 3s thus far in his career. He can get to jumpers off-the-dribble, either stepbacks or pullup jumpers. His handle and shooting ability open up driving lanes for him to get to the basket. Hyland has some craft around the rim, and can finish at tough angles, but it hasn't been consistent for him. He has hit below 59% of his shots at the rim, and part of that is due to him being very skinny and light, so playing through contact can be difficult. He also just struggles to contribute beyond scoring. He has decent assist numbers for a shooting guard, but he can dribble the air out of the ball at times and overall doesn't make high-level reads. Defensively, Hyland is hurt by his frame, and offensive players can simply drive through him and bump him off his spot because he's so light. That's when he's even in good position, which isn't often. He doesn't move his feet well on the perimeter, and overall doesn't put much effort in on defense. Hyland has shown that he has some real skills, but needs to do more than score to become a legitimate rotation player. Even with the scoring, the efficiency probably needs to improve from the 55% true shooting that he has posted thus far in his career. If Hyland can improve defensively and find ways to fit into a scheme offensively more than just dominating the ball, he could have a long career as a spark plug off the bench, similar to someone like Jordan Clarkson or Lou Williams.

Hyland will be a restricted free agent with a $12.5 million cap hold, $6.1 million Qualifying Offer, and full Bird Rights. I wouldn't expect Hyland' QO to come into play, but I wouldn't completely rule it out considering it may not be that much lower than his market value starting salary and the Clippers could play hardball with him as a restricted free agent. There's also a chance the Clippers don't even give him a QO, which would make him an unrestricted free agent. Depending on how close the Clippers are to the luxury tax after free agency, or how much cap space they need after re-signing him, if Hyland is brought back by the Clippers on a multi-year contract they could benefit from frontloading his contract, as it could give them additional flexibility in the future. Other teams will have multiple ways to sign Hyland as even teams without cap space could use the Non-Taxpayer MLE or Room MLE to sign him to an offer sheet or outright as an unrestricted free agent (it's unlikely that the Taxpayer MLE or B-Annual Exception would be enough since they are below his QO amount). However, Hyland being a restricted free agent would lower his interest among teams, as they will worry that the only way to pry him away from Los Angeles would be to overpay him. There's also a chance that Hyland is an unrestricted free agent with pretty low offers, including maybe just getting minimum offers.