Stein reports that any package <\/a>in return for Markkanen would almost certainly have to include 22-year-old guard Ausar Thompson. He\u2019s not someone the Pistons want to move. <\/p>\nDetroit selected Thompson with the fifth pick in the 2023 NBA draft, and he has steadily developed into a key player for the franchise. Through 12 games this season, he\u2019s averaging career highs in points (12.6), assists (2.9), steals (1.8), minutes (28.5), and three-point percentage (30.8). He is also grabbing 5.8 rebounds per game, up from 5.1 last season. <\/p>\n
It\u2019s easy to see why the Pistons would be intrigued by Markkanen. The 28-year-old is averaging 29.9 points per game, while adding 6.1 rebounds, 2.1 assists, and 1.1 steals, in 35.7 minutes per game. He\u2019s shooting 38.8% from beyond the arc and 48.5% from the field. Given that production, Thompson would only be the start of a return package for him.<\/p>\n
Markkanen agreed to a five-year, $238 million deal with Utah in August of 2024 and is under contract through the 2028-29 season. This season, he\u2019s making $46.4 million, but that number jumps over the next three seasons. <\/p>\n
For the 2026-27 campaign, Markkanen will make $46.1 million, and that number will rise to $49.8 million for the 2027-28 season. He\u2019ll be 31 during the 2028-29 campaign and is due to make $53.5 million. That\u2019s a lot of money to commit to a forward whose career numbers have spiked while on a bad Jazz team over the past few seasons. <\/p>\n
That said, Markkanen was a good NBA player before that; he just had to go to Utah to see his numbers explode. <\/p>\n
A starting lineup built around Cade Cunningham, Jalen Duren and Markkanen would be formidable in the Eastern Conference. The price to acquire Utah\u2019s big man might be steep, but could pay off big time.<\/p>\n
More NBA on Sports Illustrated<\/p>\n
FREE NEWSLETTER. SI BTN Newsletter. Start off your day with SI:CYMI. dark<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Jazz will want a serious return for All-Star forward Lauri Markkanen if the Pistons come calling. It…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":304545,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[557],"tags":[64,63,590,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-304544","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-nba","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304544","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=304544"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304544\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/304545"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=304544"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=304544"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=304544"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}