Through no fault of his own, Cam Johnson has basically spent the last two and a half years in NBA purgatory, playing for the Brooklyn Nets. So it\u2019s hard to blame any fans whose most vivid memories come from his time as a young role player for the Suns team that made a run to the Finals in 2021.<\/p>\n
In that same vein, it\u2019s no surprise that most fans may not realize Johnson is a drastically different player than the one he was in Phoenix. He was mostly a standstill shooter, someone who was frequently relegated to the corners on offense and asked to chase shooters around on defense.<\/p>\n
But since coming to Brooklyn, Johnson\u2019s role expanded massively, and so did his game. He became a much more versatile player, one who can create for himself and others off the dribble and can be a focal point of offense rather than a complementary option.<\/p>\n
Obviously, he\u2019s not going to supplant Nikola Jokic or Jamal Murray as primary options on this elite Nuggets offense, but he will absolutely thrive as a third option, constantly being able to attack compromised defenses. He\u2019s going to get unlimited open looks from playing off of the stars, but when asked to do more, he can competently play a primary role.<\/p>\n
Johnson a more versatile and complete player than he was in Phoenix<\/p>\n
Johsnon can now slot into almost any lineup and fill almost any role that is asked of him. This Nuggets team is very deep, and they are going to feature a lot of different looks. Johnson\u2019s Swiss Army Knife-like abilities are only going to enhance a Nuggets offense that was already elite.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s stepping right into the role vacated by Michael Porter Jr., but he can offer so much more to the team. Cam will be a toy for David Adelman and his staff to play with, and they should experiment with all kinds of combinations and figure out which lineups can change games. In years past, Denver has cratered with Jokic off the floor, but with added depth and the upgrade to Johnson, that may no longer be the case.<\/p>\n
Johnson is used to being a featured option on offense for an NBA team, so there\u2019s no reason that a Murray-Johnson duo can\u2019t give the Nuggets a strong offense even when the three-time MVP takes a breather. There\u2019s a lot of excitement in Denver, and for good reason, but it\u2019s not just the depth; it\u2019s also the new and improved starting lineup.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Through no fault of his own, Cam Johnson has basically spent the last two and a half years…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":154658,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[355,99],"class_list":["post-154657","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-nba","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154657","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=154657"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154657\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/154658"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=154657"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=154657"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=154657"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}