Jalen Duren’s All-NBA nod opens door to $287M but Pistons may balk originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
The All-NBA announcements Sunday evening handed the Detroit Pistons a question they were already dreading with a bigger price tag attached.
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Jalen Duren was named to the All-NBA Third Team, and the honor makes the 22-year-old center eligible for a five-year, $287 million designated rookie extension, according to Front Office Sports.
This amount exceeds the standard maximum by $49.5 million because of the All-NBA acknowledgment.
The bump comes from the Derrick Rose Rule, which allows teams to offer designated players up to 30 percent of the projected salary cap, rather than the usual 25 percent.
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Based on a projected $165 million cap for 2026-27, Duren’s starting salary under a Rose Rule extension would sit at roughly $57 million per year. Only the Pistons can offer that five-year version. Any outside team is limited to four years at 25 percent of the cap, capped at $177.4 million total.
Why the Pistons’ decision is harder than the honor suggests
The timing of the All-NBA selection is complicated by what Duren produced in the postseason.
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The Pistons were the Eastern Conference’s top seed and lost to the Cleveland Cavaliers in seven games in the second round. Duren’s performance was described by many as a collapse. He averaged 9.2 points and 8.8 rebounds in the playoffs after putting up 19.5 points and 10.5 rebounds on 65 percent shooting during the regular season.
League sources told reporter Hunter Patterson that “the widely held belief around the league is that he has little to no leverage to negotiate for the max,” per Piston Powered. Detroit is likely to keep Duren, but at what figure? Probably below the Rose Rule ceiling.
As a restricted free agent, Duren can sign an offer sheet with any team and force the Pistons to match.
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The Lakers, Bulls, and Nets are the three franchises currently projected to have cap space this summer. The Pistons must submit a qualifying offer of approximately $9.6 million before June 30 to preserve their matching rights.
Sunday also brought Cade Cunningham a first-team All-NBA selection, making him and Duren the first Pistons teammates to both earn All-NBA recognition since Chauncey Billups and Ben Wallace in 2006.
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