The Detroit Pistons are set to work out a new deal with Ausar Thompson soon, and they have another rookie scale extension to use as a template after Keyonte George signed with the Utah Jazz earlier today.
At the top of the offseason, the Detroit Pistons assuredly thought that they’d already have signed 22-year old All-Star Jalen Duren to a long-term extension by now. Locking up Duren for the extended future was thought to be the Pistons’ top priority entering the summer, but the big man’s team has not been the easiest for Detroit to negotiate with.
As a result, Duren has until the end of the month to decide if he’d rather take a risky qualifying offer or stay in the Motor City long-term, but he’s also inadvertently caused a delay in Ausar Thompson’s rookie scale extension. Now, the Pistons have until Oct. 20 to sign Thompson to his next deal, but there’s been a significant backlog in progress up to this point that can be tied to Duren’s restricted free agency.
For context, Thompson’s twin brother, Amen, agreed to his own rookie scale extension with the Houston Rockets earlier this month. The Western Conference guard’s new deal came in at $208 million spread across five seasons, but it’s backloaded so that Amen will make progressively more money each year.
So far, Amen has shown a much more complete offensive game as a playmaker (even without a reliable jumper) than Ausar has up to this point, but they’re used very differently within their respective schemes. The Pistons rely on Ausar as their defensive stopper who can complement Cade Cunningham and Duren at times, but the Rockets have deployed Amen as their primary creator and initiator in the half court as well. Given that crucial stylistic difference, the Pistons are not expected to offer their budding defensive ace quite as much money as his brother received, though it will likely be in the same ballpark.
“I would look at both Brandon Miller and Ausar Thompson to have more and more conversations with their respective teams, the Hornets and the Pistons, in the upcoming days and weeks,” ESPN’s Shams Charania said.
Looking across the NBA as a whole, this is a pivotal time for players from the 2023 draft class to ink new deals. Earlier today, Utah Jazz guard Keyonte George signed a five-year, $157.5 million extension to stay with his Western Conference squad for the next half decade on a deal that’ll pay out $31.5 million per season.
Though George is a more complete, prolific and reliable scorer, Thompson has a massive edge over his ‘23 draft classmate on the defensive end of the floor. Thompson was named to the All-Defensive First Team last season in addition to his third-place finish for Defensive Player of the Year, so he clears George in that facet of the game by a considerable distance. But because Thompson has been unable to develop a consistent jumper and shot just 25% from three-point range last year, there are questions as to how effective he can be on offense and what type of lineups will mask his shooting inefficiency.
In any event, the Pistons view Thompson as one of their franchise pillars at the moment, so they’re going to commit the money necessary to keep him in the Motor City. The process in doing so could have been more streamlined if Duren would have agreed to an extension prior to this point, but that is the dynamic the Pistons have been forced to balance over the last several months.
