The offseason is officially here, and for the Detroit Pistons, no decision is more consequential than the future of big man Jalen Duren. Duren bet on himself last offseason by not being willing to sign an extension in his first opportunity with the Pistons. That bet paid off to the tune of the best season of his career and All-NBA Third-Team honors.
The Pistons want to re-sign Duren to be the big man complement to star guard Cade Cunningham for the foreseeable future. He’s eligible to sign a five-year
$287 million contract courtesy of making All-NBA. He won’t get that much money from Detroit or anyone else, but how much less will be a sticking point.
Duren had a great season, and showed his offensive game is not just limited to his already valuable rim pressure as a roll man alongside Cunningham. He can face up. He can use both power and touch near the rim. He can hit his free throws.
But he has limitations, and we certainly saw those limitations in a disappointing playoff run that cost him some money on his next deal. He’s not an offensive hub, he doesn’t stretch out to the perimeter, and he doesn’t play all-world defense.
There are questions about how much money is worth in today’s NBA if you’re serious about building a contending team. Well, when you’re 22 years old and maybe just scratching the surface like Duren seems like he might be, that number is going to be nine digits and probably start with a two.
In his valuation of Duren’s season, John Hollinger pegs Duren as worth approximately $44 million a year. Hollinger’s analysis is a mix of analytics, playing time data, and projection. Hollinger, being a human who saw said playoff struggles, gives Duren’s deal a bit of a haircut and lands on five years and approximately $200 million.
That is a lot of money. A lot, a lot. It would rank Duren behind only a handful of the centers in the NBA. In terms of age and percentage of the salary cap, it would be nearly identical to the deal Alperen Sengun signed with the Houston Rockets.
Whether Hollinger is correct in his valuation or not, the team must also be careful that Duren isn’t suddenly motivated to sign an offer sheet with another team. That’s a scenario Hollinger also calls out.
“On the other hand, Duren is only 22 and coming off an All-Star regular season, and cap-room teams like Brooklyn and Chicago will be circling with offer sheets if the Pistons get cold feet.”
If the Pistons draw a hard line at around the $200 million mark, then a team like Brooklyn and Chicago can come in and offer something closer to the $230 million that Duren would be eligible for on a typical post-rookie max deal. That would leave the Pistons with an extremely difficult choice between overpaying for a potential cornerstone player or losing them for nothing.
For a contending team like Detroit, it’s a decision that effectively dictates your path for the next several years. Choose correctly and you can reasonably fight for an NBA title. Choose wrong, and you’ve cemented your status as close but never was.
Regardless of the path chosen, the choices only get harder from here on out.
