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It’s almost too perfect that the undisputed highlight of Joe Johnson’s career is a first round playoff exit.
Johnson’s NBA life never saw a higher high than April 28th 2008. He had led his Hawks to their first playoff appearance in nine years, albeit as an eighth seed with a 37-45 record. Their opponents were the top seeded Boston Celtics, who were coming off a historically dominant 66-16 season, the first of the Garnett-Pierce-Allen era.
After expectedly getting crushed in the first two games by a combined 42 points, the Hawks shockingly won Game 3 on their own court. However, in game four the Celtics took a lead into the fourth quarter and looked set to effectively end the series.
Then Joe Johnson happened.
Johnson outscored Boston 20-17 by himself in the fourth quarter, leading the Hawks to the most improbable of victories. Johnson had ice water in his veins that night, calmly drilling pull up threes with his trademark expressionless face, getting to the line and sinking clutch free throws like he was in an empty gym.
While Boston would eventually win the series in seven, Johnson and the Hawks claimed the moral victory, forever endearing themselves to their city and the NBA public with an underdog display for the ages.
Joe Johnson was 26 during that series. He was coming off back-to-back All-Star appearances, averaging an efficient 22 points, 6 assists and 5 rebounds while playing strong defence. The Boston series felt like it was the glimpse of a star, the platform from which Johnson would emerge as a top ten player in the league.
Alongside young guns Josh Smith and Al Horford, Johnson could be the leader of a trio that could legitimately compete for a title. Everything was set.
And then, well… Joe Johnson happened.
It’s not that Johnson ever got worse, it’s just that he remained abnormally, distressingly the same. Every season between 2008 and 2012 Johnson averaged between 18.2 and 21.4 points, shot between 43.7per cent and 45.8per cent from the floor, and had a usage rate between 24.9 per cent and 26.6per cent.
His Hawks became more proficient in the regular season but never threatened in the playoffs, eternally playing the backdrop to their opponent’s much more interesting, purposeful story.
The heroic Johnson that put the Hawks on his back against Boston was never seen again either. In the eight playoff elimination games that Johnson played as a Hawk he averaged a meagre 17.6 points on 38 per cent shooting.
The perceived fundamental problem of Johnson is that he’s never been a leader. There’s an expectation in the NBA that when you’re a 20-point-per-game scorer on a $123.7 million contract, your team needs to take on your personality.
Unfortunately for Johnson, he’s never had a personality. He’s painfully passive, someone who drifts out of games with a regularity that defies his talent.
When his Atlanta team collapsed in sweeps in back to back years against Cleveland and Orlando in the playoffs, Johnson was a meek bystander.
In the latter series in particular, when the Hawks were visibly and disgustingly quitting on their coach (the fully fit Hawks lost all four games by 14 points or more), Johnson was leading the apathetic charge, shooting a ghastly 29.8 per cent for the series (17.6% from three though!).
Nothing has changed in Brooklyn. In 2013 the Nets had the most atrocious playoff loss in recent memory, losing a game seven at home to a Chicago team whose second best player was Nate Robinson. Johnson was the worst player on the court that game, contriving to shoot an impressively awful 2 for 14, finishing the biggest game of the season with six points.
Good players have bad games and terrible shooting nights. Kobe Bryant shot 6 for 24 in game seven of the finals, it’s fine. The problem is that while one gets the sense that every bad game that Kobe has keeps him awake at night, it’s not clear whether Johnson cares in the slightest.
All we have with Johnson is his blank, vague, expressionless face. There’s no fire, nor even the hint of the match to ignite something, anything. In 15 years in the NBA Johnson has amassed 13 technical fouls total. Russell Westbrook had 15 this year alone.
There’s nothing really antagonistic about Joe Johnson. He’s not overly selfish or petulant or recalcitrant. He just is. He’s become antagonistic purely for the fact that there’s nothing antagonistic about him. He’s an empty product, someone who just exists, wasting away in a waveless sea of I-guess-that’s-OKmid-range jump-shots.
Johnson turns 34 in June and for the first time we might be reaching an exciting turning point in his career – he might be becoming bad at basketball. After a quietly remarkable playoff run last year, Johnson has abjectly stunk in the first four games of this year’s playoffs.
He’s shooting an abysmal 33.3 per cent and playing terrible defence. He’s old, struggling through injuries and coming off a mediocre season.
With Amar’e Stoudemire’s inferno of uninsured dollars coming off the books this year, at $24.9 million Johnson’s only competition for ‘worst contract in the NBA’ is the guy who shares his backcourt.
Remarkably, Deron Williams is also Johnson’s best case for optimism right now. Two days ago Williams was even more maligned than Johnson, someone whose ineptitude was reaching historical levels.
In games two and three, Williams combined for five points total on 2 for 15 shooting. Then in game four, Williams caught fire, winding back the clock to 2008 and dropping a game-winning 35 points off the back of some celestial threes and deliciously ungodly crossovers.
The beauty and tragedy of sports is that everyone has a short memory. All that we can think about with Deron Williams right now is his array of stunning moves at Barclays; his 2 for 15 is a distant memory.
Joe Johnson can re-write his own script too.
The Hawks are there for the taking. Millsap and Horford are banged up, Korver is ice cold, the bench is deplorable and coach Budenholzer is choking on the sideline. Brooklyn can legitimately win this series.
Seven years ago Joe Johnson’s career seemed to kick-start with a heroic performance in a first round Eastern conference series between the 1 and 8 seeds, featuring the Atlanta Hawks and a veteran-laden team from the northeast.
In 2015 the scenario is the same, with Johnson on the other side this time. With one or two big shots, Johnson can forever change his legacy. He can beat the 1 seed that he couldn’t in 2008, and find redemption in the process. That’s the irrational magic of sport.
In a split second, with one roll of the wrist, Joe Johnson could erase the past seven years of mediocrity, apathy, disappointment and nothingness. Does he deserve it? Probably not. But it might finally bring a smile to that expressionless face of his.