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Pistons’ Cade Cunningham gets future projection that should excite fans originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
Cade Cunningham of the Detroit Pistons is already considered one of the best players in the NBA of the moment. During the 2025-26 season, Cunningham appeared in 64 regular-season games and averaged 23.9 points, 9.9 assists, and 5.5 rebounds per contest. Those are strong numbers.
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But, the future may be even brighter for Cunningham. His story is just beginning.
In a feature out on Monday, Andy Bailey of Bleacher Report predicts the 30 best NBA players in 2030. Cunningham isn’t just one of them. He’s in the top 10.
Pistons’ Cade Cunningham projected to be in ‘heated MVP discussions’ by 2030
Cunningham will be 28 in four years. And he may be at the top of his game. In Bailey’s tally, Cunningham is named the No. 7 best player in the NBA in 2030.
“What has to be truly terrifying for opponents around the league is the fact that Cade has some very obvious areas for improvement,” Bailey states in the piece.
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He adds: “Over the next four years, he can absolutely figure out how to take a little better care of the ball and more consistently hit from the outside. Fine-tuning that, while maintaining his volume playmaking could have Cunningham in some pretty heated MVP discussions.”
It’s truly exciting to see how strong Cunningham is on the court right now and to think that he actually has room to get better. One testament to his talent was how he handled the 2026 NBA playoffs. Over 14 games, he averaged 28.1 points, 7.5 assists and 5.1 rebounds per game, according to StatMuse. What’s mind-blowing, though, is that he averaged 41 minutes per game. That’s a lot of time on the court. If the Pistons can get him some help and bring those minutes down a touch, the extra rest could quickly help improve his game and skyrocket him to elite status.
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