Pistons forward Ausar Thompson agreed to a five-year, $155 million rookie scale extension, ESPN’s Shams Charania reports (Twitter references).
Hunter Patterson of The Athletic confirms that Thompson’s new contract is fully guaranteed, according to Charanya, and contains no options.via Twitter).
Charania reported Earlier Friday, Thompson and the Pistons were in active talks about an extension and said at the time there was optimism about getting a deal done.
Thompson is one of the NBA’s premier defenders, finishing third in the 2025/26 Defensive Player of the Year voting and being named to the All-Defensive First Team. He helped Detroit go 60-22 last season, averaging 9.9 points, 5.7 rebounds, 3.1 assists, an NBA-best 2.0 steals and 0.9 blocks in 73 regular season contests (26.0 minutes per game).
The fifth overall pick in the 2023 draft, Thompson also appeared in 14 playoff games for the Pistons in 2025-26, averaging 8.2 ppg, 7.9 ppg, 3.1 ppg, 2.0 ppg and 1.8 ppg at 30.5 mpg.
Thompson will make $11.12 million this season in the final year of his rookie contract. His extension, which starts in 2027/28, is reportedly worth $31 million annually. This is the same basic quantity Keyonte George received from the Jazz earlier Friday, though George’s deal also contains unlikely incentives ($500K per year).
Thompson is arguably the best perimeter defender in the NBA with a unique combination of size, strength, athleticism, skill, anticipation and awareness, and he’s a great rebounder and plus playmaker at small forward. However, while Thompson has shot 52.5% from the field in his career, he is essentially a non-shooter as he shot just 20.4% from three and 60.0% from free throws.
Still, the Pistons were much better with Thompson on the court in each of his first three seasons despitehis limitations as a shooter. And clearly, the team appreciates his contributions and believes he will continue to improve.
In his full narrative for ESPN.comCharanya notes that Thompson and his identical twin Amin Thompson are the first brothers in NBA history to each sign a contract worth more than $100 million. Amin, the fourth overall pick in 2023, signed a five-year, $208 million rookie deal with the Rockets earlier this month.
The Pistons are still in contract negotiations with the restricted free agent center Jalen Durenaccording to Charanya, who says Detroit has offered the NBA center a third-team deal in the $190 million range. Duren still hopes to do more than that, but the team believes his offers were fair, Charanya adds.
