CBJ looking forward to Johnson making 'unbelievable plays' in union blue

Ville Siren has seen a lot in his years as a scout, but when he turned on the film of Kent Johnson, it's fair to say he was a bit blown away.
The University of Michigan playmaker has pure skill, the kind you can't teach. That's always exciting for someone like Siren to find, which is one reason Johnson became appointment viewing for the Blue Jackets director of amateur scouting leading up to last weekend's NHL Draft.
In fact, Siren saw Johnson play live five or six times and also watched every one of his games with the Wolverines on tape this past season.

"Each and every game, he made some plays like, 'Oh jeez,'" Siren said after the Blue Jackets selected Johnson fifth overall Friday night. "You watch him more and every game, he made great plays and got me out of my seat a couple of times."
The follow up question was obvious -- is that something that routinely happens during Siren's scouting trips?
"Not very often, but sometimes," he said with a laugh. "He has instincts, great hands, he can make plays, he can score. And he competes with the puck."
The skill is obvious when you watch highlights of Johnson, standing out on two plays in particular. When he was playing junior hockey with Trail of the BCHL, Johnson scored a "Michigan" goal, the lacrosse style flip that seems to be happening more and more as talented youngsters infiltrate the upper echelons of hockey, including the NHL.
Then, last year when he actually was a Wolverine, Johnson scored one of the highlight-reel goals of the season in college hockey in a game against Minnesota. After skating with speed from his own defensive zone past the blue line along the right wing, he cut to the middle of the ice, then quickly toe-dragged back to the right to deke past a Minnesota defender. Then, from a sharp angle, Johnson quickly roofed a shot past the helpless Gophers goalie with a flick of a backhand.
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Again, those are the things you can't teach, and Johnson has the creativity to consider such moves, the anticipation to do them in the right spot, and the skill to pull them off.
"Just from a young age, having fun out there, I think that helps with my creativity," Johnson said. "I think naturally I am just a creative kid, and my skills, I work on them a ton. I think it makes sense that they are good."
The numbers help bear that out, as Johnson has been pretty much impossible to stop each of the past two seasons. A bit of a late bloomer from North Vancouver, B.C., who went through the BCHL rather than the top-tier WHL, he was dominant two years ago with the Smoke Eaters, posting 101 points in 52 games to win the league scoring title by a full 30 points.
Last year at Michigan, it didn't take Johnson long to get his scoring touch down, as he finished with a 9-18-27 line in 26 games as a true freshman while getting better as the season went on.

"I wasn't a very good player, but I don't even think of the stuff he does," Michigan head coach Mel Pearson said. "Just his brain offensively -- he has a great stick, can score, can make plays and was probably one of two guys who would have been our most improved player from the year. The second half, he was just dynamite.
"He's not afraid to go the hard areas, but the thing that really sticks out is just his hockey brain, his hockey IQ, and then offensively his skills. I don't know everybody in the draft, but it would be surprising if there was anybody who could match his skill level."
Pearson added that one of the reasons it took Johnson time to adjust at U-M is because he was moved from center to wing, giving Johnson the chance to play on a line alongside center Matty Beniers, who was taken No. 2 overall by Seattle in Friday's draft.
Previously, the 6-1 Johnson had played center, and Kekalainen said he expects the talented prospect to move back to the pivot as he gains experience.
"They put him and Beniers on the same line and they clicked right away," the Blue Jackets general manager said. "Kent Johnson always has played center except at Michigan, but he's also a freshman. We talked to him and he is adamant that, 'I am a center.' We talked to the coaching staff at Michigan, what do they see? Yeah, they see him as a center.
"It's hard to play center as an 18-year-old against the 24-, 25-year-olds in college, so we believe he is a center. He has all those abilities, all the ingredients of a good center in the National Hockey League."

Johnson said he appreciates the fact the Blue Jackets forecast him as a complete player and not just a scorer down the road.
"I think they really like my hockey mind," Johnson said of his predraft interviews with the Blue Jackets. "They saw past the fact that I'm a skilled kid and that I was a really hard worker, too. Whenever you get a compliment on your work ethic, that means a lot more than a compliment on your skill, so I was really happy that they talked about that with me."
But let's also be honest. At the end of the day, the Blue Jackets took Johnson at No. 5 overall because he can make the hardest thing in hockey -- putting the puck in the net -- look easy.
"We always talk about instincts, hockey sense, character -- those are big things," Kekalainen said. "I think he has all of them. … He makes unbelievable plays. He seems to have that anticipation where before the puck gets to him, he knows what to do with it. I'm sure you've seen highlights of him doing it.
"That's the biggest thing to me. In the NHL, it's getting faster and faster. It's not necessarily the feet, it's the anticipation, it's the instincts that make you play faster, and he has all of them. He has tremendous hands and skill as well. Personally, I couldn't be more excited."