Playoff Player Review: Ausar Thompson

Mandatory Credit: Brad Penner

Ausar Thompson entered this past season on the inactive list due to blood clot issues that arose at the end of his rookie season. A second year that didn’t start for Thompson until late November, 2024, ended with his first-ever playoff appearance as a starter.

In today’s Playoff Player Review, we’ll show how the OTE products’ playoff debut went at the end of the Detroit Pistons' magical season.

Positives

Entering the playoffs, the Pistons community wondered whether Thompson’s defense would translate to the playoffs. With a matchup against one of the best playoff performers in the NBA, Jalen Brunson, this was a perfect litmus test to see how impactful Thompson truly is on the defensive end.

Thompson passed that test with flying colors.

Let’s start with the basics: The Pistons’ defense was much better with Thompson on the floor during the playoffs than with him off. Detroit’s defense was 6.2 points better in the 135 minutes Thompson played with him on versus with him off the floor. This shouldn’t be a surprise, as this has been the case since Thompson was inserted as the starter on January 4th.

Some net-rating numbers that I am more interested in looking into are the duo of Thompson and Jalen Duren.