In the womb, Ausar Thompson was initially noted by doctors as “Baby A.” He was supposed to be born ahead of his brother Amen, but the twins flipped just before birth.
Since making their way into the world, their cycle of switching continues.
“After a couple of years, one just flips the other one,” Troy Thompson Jr., the twins’ eldest brother, told The Athletic. “But it’s not like one regresses, it’s more like you’re stacking a brick on top of another brick. And then you have to use that same brick that’s stacked on top (of the first brick) to get up again. So it’s kind of like one will be ahead, then the other one’s ahead. They’re never even.”
Troy recalled Amen being the first twin to walk, and within 24 hours, Ausar took his first steps. Though Troy didn’t remember which twin he tossed into the pool to learn to swim first, the same process followed as they began treading water.
“Growing up it was definitely like that,” Ausar said with a laugh after chugging a post-practice Gatorade. “One of us would average more points than the other, then it’d flip. Then one would have a better season.”
After Ausar spent his first two NBA seasons supporting Amen as he quickly ascended into one of the most promising young players in the association, the Detroit Pistons are confident the younger of the twins is primed to make another flip and join his brother as one of the league’s rising stars.
The Pistons’ Ausar Thompson showed encouraging signs in the preseason as he prepared for his third NBA season. (Justin Ford / Getty Images)
Ausar spent a portion of the summer training with Amen in Spain and Florida. And after Ausar’s summer of offseason work, both with Amen and his Pistons teammates, Detroit believes he is poised to take the next step in his career.
Assistant coach Fred Vinson led workouts this summer with Ausar and Amen in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., and after watching the twins play one-on-one at the end of their workouts, he had no doubt Ausar was ready to do just that.
“Seeing (Ausar) go at his brother and one time get the best of his brother, it was a joy,” Vinson said. “That, obviously, is part of his confidence process, too. So for me, I’m like, ‘OK, (Ausar), who in the league is better defensively than your brother? If you can do it against him, you can do it against a lot of people.’”
Vinson isn’t the only one on the Pistons who can envision Ausar making a jump. Pistons All-Star Cade Cunningham coordinated workouts for teammates this summer in Las Vegas, San Diego and Texas. He, too, liked what he saw from Ausar.
“Ausar had a great summer,” Cunningham told reporters in September. “I think he’s really going to make a lot of noise this year. He’s going to wake a lot of people up in a loud way.”
Ausar took a diplomatic approach when discussing his offseason, including his battles with his twin, but Troy was more forthcoming.
“Ausar is really bigger, stronger, faster than Amen, to be honest,” Troy said with a laugh. “So whatever views you have for Amen, just know you have the same thing in Detroit with Ausar.”
The Houston Rockets selected Amen one pick before the Pistons took Ausar in the 2023 NBA Draft. Amen earned All-Defensive First Team honors and ranked fifth in Defensive Player of the Year voting in 2024-25. Ausar, meanwhile, had a delayed debut in his second season after being limited to an offseason of walking on a treadmill and form shooting due to a blood clot diagnosis in March 2024 that cut his rookie season short.
Ausar joked that he, too, would’ve made the cut for an All-Defensive squad last season had he met the 65-game threshold. He came six games shy. Based on his experience as their older brother, Troy thinks it might be time for the twins to flip once again.
Ausar is coming off the first summer since being drafted where he’s had an opportunity to refine his game. Couple that with the fact the Pistons will be more reliant on him than they’ve been in his first two seasons, and you have a recipe for a potential breakout campaign.
The 22-year-old wing carried the momentum from his first postseason appearance, against the New York Knicks, into the offseason, and did so alongside Amen. But a mindset shift for Ausar, which Amen helped facilitate, was equally as valuable as the work they put in on the hardwood.
Pine Crest served as a breeding ground for Ausar’s confidence this summer, but his ability to lift weights and properly condition factored in as well. He was listed at 215 pounds on Detroit’s training camp roster, but he looks as if he could be slightly bulkier than that.
The added strength Ausar is equipped with should give credence to his new mindset.
“(Amen) played 32 minutes a night (last season),” Ausar said. “We talked about the mentality going into the game. … I feel like that’s the most important thing. Going in with the mentality of wanting to kill whoever is in front of you, whether that’s offense or defense. But (I have to) do it in a team aspect. You want to kill them, but you want to do it within the system.”
Luckily for him, he’ll be more of a focal point within the Pistons’ system than ever before.
That was Detroit coach J.B. Bickerstaff’s plan before the news of Jaden Ivey’s arthroscopic surgery, which will sideline him for at least the first month of the season. In the preseason, Bickerstaff intentionally put Ausar in positions to explore his limits as an offensive initiator to alleviate pressure off the All-NBA Cunningham.
To some degree, the explosion Ausar shows with his quick-twitch muscles with the ball in his hands as he attacks the rim or sends opposing players’ shots careening off the glass can be a hindrance to his jump shot. Vinson worked closely with Ausar in Florida on how to redistribute the energy he generates from his lower body when taking jumpers.
“The gift of his ability to explode quickly,” Vinson said, as he acted out the motions of his answer, “is detrimental from a shooting perspective. Because if your lower body is moving that fast, it’s hard to get underneath the ball. … So that’s the thing, it’s teaching him you can have that fire and explosion of your hips when you’re attacking the basket and you’re looking to go dunk on somebody and finish. But when you’re shooting, it has to slow down.
“There has to be more rhythm to it. That way, you’ll allow your body time to get underneath the ball. So if I slow my lower body down, there’s more of a rhythm and fluidity where I allow the ball to get above me, and now I can get more arc on it. So that’s one of the main things they’re working on.”
As Ausar continues to progress with high expectations, it’s important to remember how much Bickerstaff was asking of him last season, given he had just two weeks to ramp up between when the NBA’s fitness-to-play panel cleared him and his first game.
“To try to compete at an NBA level and be asked to do so many different things as far as guarding the other team’s best offensive player, and then trying to play offense,” Bickerstaff said on media day. “(All) while you’re working your way into shape, that’s extremely difficult to do.
“What Ausar did last year, and his ability to finish the year the way he did, just shows how talented he is, how committed he is and how willing he is to do all the extra work. And he did that at a high level. So now this summer, being healthy for him was huge.”
J.B. Bickerstaff shares his thoughts on what Ausar Thompson having a full offseason will do for his development and conditioning: pic.twitter.com/AiTPqX2xo8
— Hunter Patterson (@HunterPatterson) September 29, 2025
It’s now imperative for the Pistons to continue experimenting with Ausar’s on-ball capabilities, given Ivey’s absence. It was a small sample size of exploration during Thompson’s four preseason games. He averaged 8.3 points on 48 percent from the field, 5.5 rebounds, 2.5 assists, 1.5 steals and 1.0 block in 21.0 minutes per contest.
His traditional stats might not wow you, but his impact extends beyond the boxscore. Ausar’s assist ratio (20.4) and assist-to-turnover ratio (2.0) are higher than any of his regular-season or playoff numbers in those categories. Yes, it was a four-game stretch, but it shows the way Bickerstaff is looking to optimize Ausar as a primary ballhandler this season.
The key for Ausar to unlock that potential, as much as the paint touches and increased free-throw attempts he’s seeking, is staying in the moment.
“I’ve always wanted to do whatever I do to the highest capacity, and I think with basketball a lot of it is mental,” Ausar said. “So I just work on the mental part of it, and I think everything follows after that. … My mentality is I want to follow the system. … But I have to be in the right mind state to do that and not worry about all the outside factors.”
Doing so is much easier said than done. Especially considering the Pistons aren’t taking anyone in the league by surprise this year. Opposing teams know what they’re capable of, and game plans will likely feature multiple ways to force the ball out of Cunningham’s hands.
But Vinson believes Ausar has added motivation, on top of his mindset change, heading into this season.
“As a sibling, you want to perform at the level, or better, in most cases than your sibling,” Vinson said. “And I think there’s an element of that. (Ausar) wants to see his brother play well, of course. But I do think the competitor in him is like, ‘OK, I want to play at a high level as well, if not even a higher level, than my brother.’”
At the core of Ausar’s development is the shift in mentality he fostered during the offseason, with the help of Amen. If Troy’s observation on his younger brothers holds, it should mean Ausar is indeed on track to become the best version of himself on the hardwood this year.
“I don’t think about (having a breakout season), but if my mentality is where I want it to be every single game, then I should be able to do that,” Ausar said.
“We’ll see if the cycle continues.”
