{"id":822754,"date":"2026-08-23T03:38:17","date_gmt":"2026-08-23T03:38:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/822754\/"},"modified":"2026-08-23T03:38:17","modified_gmt":"2026-08-23T03:38:17","slug":"central-notes-duren-lanier-splitter-pacers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/822754\/","title":{"rendered":"Central Notes: Duren, Lanier, Splitter, Pacers"},"content":{"rendered":"

Negotiations between Jalen Duren<\/a> and the Pistons are becoming \u201cnoxious\u201d as they drag into late summer, a source tells Kurt Helin of NBC Sports<\/a>. The team is trying to strike a balance by giving Duren enough money to keep him happy without overpaying him, but it sounds like the two sides are still far apart.<\/p>\n

Duren believes he\u2019s earned a max contract by posting an All-Star and All-NBA season, but as a restricted free agent, he doesn\u2019t have much leverage to push the Pistons in that direction. He\u2019s eligible for a \u201cRose rule\u201d deal worth 30% of the salary cap (up to $287MM over five years), but Helin suggests he would be satisfied with a contract similar to Victor Wembanyama<\/a>\u2018s at $239MM over five years or 25% of the cap.<\/p>\n

Management is reportedly limiting its offers to a little more than $30MM per year, which Helin points out is close to what the Lakers gave Walker Kessler<\/a> and less than Alperen Sengun<\/a> is earning in Houston.\u00a0Duren has the option of accepting the team\u2019s $9.6MM qualifying offer, but that means giving up a lot of guaranteed money.<\/p>\n

Helin relays recent comments from Vincent Goodwill of ESPN on The Hoop Collective podcast indicating unrest between Duren and the team (YouTube link<\/a>). \u201cThere\u2019s certain things that a player should not have to hear,\u201d Goodwill said. \u201cYou know what I mean? There\u2019s certain things that a player does not have to hear when the messaging comes back about why you\u2019re not getting what you believe to be your value.\u201d<\/p>\n

There\u2019s more from the Central Division:<\/p>\n

After an impressive performance at the Las Vegas Summer League, Chaz Lanier<\/a> wants to prove to the Pistons that he can be more than a shooter, per Coty M. Davis of The Detroit News<\/a> (subscription required). The second-year guard averaged 17.4 PPG in Las Vegas while connecting at 51.1% from three-point range. \u201cThis whole summer I\u2019ve been very intentional about getting better in different areas,\u201d Lanier said. \u201cTo play for (coach) J.B. (Bickerstaff), the first thing you have to do is be a really good team defender, and I\u2019ve been really intentional about that. I\u2019ve also been intentional about adopting an aggressive mentality and taking my shots, not passing up anything \u2014 just honing in on all of the small things of my game.\u201d
\nJoe Cowley of The Chicago Sun-Times<\/a> examines whether new coach Tiago Splitter can develop the Bulls\u2018 young projects the same way he did with Deni Avdija<\/a> in Portland. Of particular interest are third-year forward Matas Buzelis<\/a> and star rookie Caleb Wilson<\/a>. \u201c(Everyone has) got to understand this is a process and not every night is going to be sunny and make all the shots,\u201d Splitter said of Wilson. \u201cIt\u2019s going to be up and down. But the trajectory has to be on an upward motion. That\u2019s how we see it and part of the development. (Wilson has) got to also understand that part and that we\u2019ve got a process going (for the) long run.\u201d
\nThe Pacers have announced a new partnership with DAZN for their local broadcasts, according to Dustin Dopirak of The Indianapolis Star<\/a>. They were among the teams whose games were formerly telecast by Main Street Sports Group.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Negotiations between Jalen Duren and the Pistons are becoming \u201cnoxious\u201d as they drag into late summer, a source…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":822755,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[62693,223388,148151,19798,355,99,222193],"class_list":["post-822754","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-caleb-wilson","tag-chaz-lanier","tag-jalen-duren","tag-matas-buzelis","tag-nba","tag-sports","tag-tiago-splitter"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/822754","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=822754"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/822754\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/822755"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=822754"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=822754"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=822754"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}