Team: Detroit Pistons · Age: 28 · Position: PF/C · As of: 2026-07-18
2026-27 median projection
| GP | MPG | FG% | FT% | 3PM | PTS | REB | AST | STL | BLK | TO |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 67 | 28.0 | .555 | .790 | 1.2 | 14.8 | 6.8 | 1.5 | 0.7 | 1.0 | 1.4 |
Nine-cat: top-80 to top-110 median, with balanced big-man categories. Points: B. Dynasty: 6.5/10; useful prime-age starter, unlikely to become a franchise asset again.
Role and evidence
Collins produced 13.6 points, 5.3 rebounds, 1.0 assist, 0.9 steals, and 0.7 blocks in 27.1 minutes for the Clippers, shooting .552 from the field, .406 from three, and .766 at the line (ESPN 2025-26 line). The NBA's Detroit acquisition report confirms the move and highlights the same scoring, rebounding, and efficiency baseline.
The cleanest role is starting power forward, secondary rim runner, corner spacer, and small-ball center. Duren absorbs rebounds but also keeps Collins from wrestling with full-time centers. The July 8 Locked On Pistons analysis emphasized his offensive rebounding, corner shooting, and play-finishing fit; that mechanism supports the efficiency projection but does not guarantee a usage spike.
His roster and minutes confidence are high. The main statistical uncertainty is whether Detroit uses him for 25 minutes beside Duren plus a few at center, or lets Holland/Thompson close smaller lineups around a single big.
Range
- Ceiling: 17/8 with 1.5 threes and 1.2 blocks if he closes at center and Duren misses time.
- Floor: 25 MPG, 12/5, and only streaming value if Detroit's wing-heavy closing groups dominate.
Career record
Pre-NBA: Wake Forest, two seasons (2015-16 and 2016-17). 7.3 points and 3.9 rebounds on .547 shooting in 31 games as a freshman, then 19.2 points and 9.8 rebounds on .622 shooting across 33 starts as a sophomore. Won ACC Most Improved Player and first-team All-ACC in 2017, set a Wake Forest record with 12 consecutive 20-point games, and became the first Demon Deacon since Tim Duncan in 1996-97 to post 600 points and 300 rebounds in a season. Draft: 2017, first round, 19th pick, Atlanta Hawks.
| Season | Age | Team | GP | MPG | PTS | REB | AST | STL | BLK | 3PM | FG% | FT% | TO |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2017-18 | 20 | ATL | 74 | 24.1 | 10.5 | 7.3 | 1.3 | 0.6 | 1.1 | 0.2 | .576 | .715 | 1.4 |
| 2018-19 | 21 | ATL | 61 | 30.0 | 19.5 | 9.8 | 2.0 | 0.4 | 0.6 | 0.9 | .560 | .763 | 2.0 |
| 2019-20 | 22 | ATL | 41 | 33.2 | 21.6 | 10.1 | 1.5 | 0.8 | 1.6 | 1.4 | .583 | .800 | 1.8 |
| 2020-21 | 23 | ATL | 63 | 29.3 | 17.6 | 7.4 | 1.2 | 0.5 | 1.0 | 1.3 | .556 | .833 | 1.3 |
| 2021-22 | 24 | ATL | 54 | 30.8 | 16.2 | 7.8 | 1.8 | 0.6 | 1.0 | 1.2 | .526 | .793 | 1.1 |
| 2022-23 | 25 | ATL | 71 | 30.0 | 13.1 | 6.5 | 1.2 | 0.6 | 1.0 | 1.0 | .508 | .803 | 1.1 |
| 2023-24 | 26 | UTA | 68 | 28.0 | 15.1 | 8.5 | 1.1 | 0.6 | 0.9 | 1.3 | .532 | .795 | 1.4 |
| 2024-25 | 27 | UTA | 40 | 30.5 | 19.0 | 8.2 | 2.0 | 1.0 | 1.0 | 1.5 | .527 | .848 | 2.6 |
| 2025-26 | 28 | LAC | 69 | 27.1 | 13.6 | 5.3 | 1.0 | 0.9 | 0.7 | 1.3 | .552 | .766 | 1.4 |
| Career | 541 | 28.9 | 15.7 | 7.7 | 1.4 | 0.6 | 1.0 | 1.1 | .546 | .789 | 1.5 |
Transactions: traded to Utah on July 7, 2023 for Rudy Gay and a future second; acquired by the Clippers in a three-team trade on July 7, 2025; signed with Detroit for three years and $51 million via sign-and-trade on July 8, 2026.
Fantasy history: Year-by-year season-end nine-category finishes are not verifiable from the sources reached in this pass, and are not estimated here. One historical marker is verifiable: NBC Sports' nine-category retrospective rated his 2019-20 as roughly the 37th to 38th best per-game season in a fifteen-year player pool. Note that this is a ranking of seasons within a historical pool, not a finish among that year's players, so it should not be read as "he finished 38th in 2019-20." The durable shape is a plus-percentage big: field-goal percentage has been above .500 in all nine seasons and above .546 for his career, blocks sit at or near 1.0 in seven of nine years, threes arrived in 2018-19 and have held between 0.9 and 1.5 ever since, and turnovers are low for the usage in every season except 2024-25. The weaknesses are equally stable — assists have never reached 2.1, and steals have cleared 0.8 only twice. Points leagues have consistently valued him below his category value because the profile is efficiency and blocks rather than volume.
Durability: 74, 61, 41, 63, 54, 71, 68, 40, 69. Two of the three worst seasons have identifiable single causes. The 41 in 2019-20 was driven by a 25-game NBA suspension announced in November 2019 for a positive pralmorelin test under the anti-drug policy, not by injury. The 54 in 2021-22 came from a right heel and foot strain beginning February 11, 2022 that cost seven games, followed by confirmation after March 11 of a plantar fascia tear in the right foot alongside a sprained right finger. The 40 in 2024-25 ended with a left lateral ankle sprain suffered in the fourth quarter against Memphis on March 12, confirmed by MRI, from which he did not return; he had also missed substantial time earlier that season for reasons this pass did not individually verify. The pattern to weigh is that he has cleared 70 games only twice in nine years, and the foot and ankle history is the recurring soft tissue theme.
Trajectory: The arc is a peak at 22 followed by a long, managed decline in role rather than in ability. His 2019-20 season, 21.6 points and 10.1 rebounds with 1.6 blocks and 1.4 threes, remains the ceiling, and every year since has traded volume for efficiency as he moved from featured Atlanta big to Utah's veteran scorer to a Clippers play-finisher next to a full-time center. The 2025-26 numbers make the mechanism explicit: per 36 minutes his scoring fell from 22.4 to 18.1 and his rebounding from 9.7 to 7.0 versus the prior year, so this was a genuine shrink in role and rebounding opportunity, not just fewer minutes. What went the other way is real too — .552 from the field was his best mark since 2019-20 and his three-point rate held, so he became a more efficient, lower-usage player rather than a worse one. At 28 turning 29 in September, he is at the front edge of the decline phase for a leaper whose game has always leaned on athleticism at the rim, and the foot and ankle history argues against betting on a bounce-back. The specific caution for 2026-27 is rebounding: he is again slated to play beside a high-volume rebounding center in Jalen Duren, which is the same configuration that produced last season's career-low 5.3 boards, so projections materially above that figure need a role change to justify them.
Career sources: ESPN career stats · Wikipedia — John Collins · KSL Sports — 2024-25 ankle injury · KSL Sports — finger injury and Jazz arrival · NBC Sports — nine-cat retrospective
Open questions
- How many center minutes does Collins receive when Duren and Reed are available?
- Was the 40.6% three-point season sustainable or a high-end outlier?
- Does Detroit use him as a fourth scorer or mostly as a finisher?