Pistons Notes: Cunningham, Duren, Sasser, Huerter, Stewart, Jenkins

Pistons coach J.B. Bickerstaff detailed during his pregame press conference on Friday his reasons why Cade Cunningham should receive the Most Valuable Player award.

“I wish I could (state Cade’s case MVP) with a better, stronger voice…I mean, he deserves it,” Bickerstaff said. “Right now, again, if the season were to end today, the best player on the team with the best win percentage, to me, is the guy that deserves to be the MVP.

“What he does for us on both ends of the floor; he doesn’t take nights, or times, or possessions off defensively. We’ll put him on the other team’s best perimeter player, and he’ll go down on the offensive end and score his 25 points but create for his teammates. He’s second in the league in assists and makes his teammates better also. And, then the game’s on the line, you can give him the ball, and he’s one of the best clutch players we have in this league. So, I’m hard-pressed to find a better example or statement of who the MVP should be.”

Cunningham is averaging 25.4 points, a career-high 9.8 assists, 5.4 rebounds, 1.5 steals and 1.0 blocks per game for the East-leading Pistons, whose 44-14 record is the NBA’s best mark.

Here’s more on the Pistons:

• All-Star center Jalen Duren said he never wanted to leave the organization, even during its franchise-worst 14-win season in 2023/24. “That’s not my character. That’s not me. I’m super loyal,” Duren told Marc J. Spears of Andscape. “I hang my hat on loyalty. I was raised on loyalty. These are my brothers, man. Honestly, I don’t just say that just because we’re all on the same team. I honestly love these guys. So, in my head, looking at it, I didn’t see a bad team. I was young. I knew we had pieces. We were just missing something. Experience would be the easy thing to say. We were just missing something. We were missing a lot, actually. But for me, I just never saw it as this is not going to work. I always knew that once we figured some things out, grabbed a couple pieces, established a culture, maybe we can be something.”
• Marcus Sasser and trade deadline acquisition Kevin Huerter haven’t cracked the rotation, but Bickerstaff said there will be opportunities for both players to earn minutes next month. “We got a heavy March, right? We got a ton of games in March where everybody will get an opportunity to play,” he said. “And because of our depth, we feel confident that we can still compete at a high level with the depth that we have and get those guys some chances to play.” Sasser played 11 minutes during Friday’s overtime win against Cleveland but didn’t score.
• Isaiah Stewart, who is still serving a seven-game suspension for his involvement in a pre-All-Star break brawl with Charlotte, says he patterns his game after Hall of Famer Ben Wallace, who earned four Defensive Player of the Year awards with Detroit. “He paved the way for us undersized guys,” Stewart told Vince Goodwill of ESPN. “I’m trying to live up to that and put my name somewhere positive in this organization.”
• Daniss Jenkins, who was promoted from his two-way contract with a two-year, $8MM deal earlier this month, hit three clutch free throws after getting fouled on a three-point attempt in the closing seconds of regulation on Friday. That allowed the Pistons to steal a game against the Cavs in overtime. “He’s been mature. I hate to say that, but it’s not surprising anymore what he’s done,” Bickerstaff said. “When his number has been called, whatever the moment has been, he’s been a productive for us and effective for us.”