UNC Basketball: Scouting report of Tar Heel freshman Puff Johnson

The Offensive End: Potent Shooting, Soft Touch, Physical Limitations

JR (’18-19): 22.1 ppg, 9.4 rpg, 1.6 spg, 1.2 bpg, .460 3P% (61 3PM)

EYBL (’19): 15.4 ppg, 4.1 rpg, 0.8 apg, 0.8 spg, .381/.319/.800 shooting

SR (’19-20): 14.4 ppg, 8.2 rpg, 2.6 apg, 2.3 spg, 1.7 bpg, .463/.446/.774 shooting

Unbeknownst to absolutely no one, Puff Johnson’s main selling point on the recruiting trail was his established track record as one of the best perimeter shooters in the country, sporting a smooth one-motion jumper with a high release point, settling just above his forehead.

He’s naturally a hop shooter, showcasing the polished shot prep in a similar fashion as his older brother, but he’s more than comfortable one-two stepping into his jumper from a standstill or when curling off screens (in various directions). Johnson’s shot extends well beyond NBA range, making him a lethal threat to fire away as a trailer in transition or in pick-and-pop actions as the screener.

Puff lacks the shotmaking versatility and pure ceiling as Cam — he’s not one to stop on a dime off of a full sprint, doesn’t offer much pull-up shooting equity, and he doesn’t have Cam’s quick trigger and condensed shot motion — but the younger Johnson is nonetheless a shooting specialist in every sense of the word.

The southpaw shot 46.0% from three as a junior, 44.6% from three as a senior and 31.8 percent from three on the 2019 EYBL circuit. The last mark seems low but matches up with some of the better shooters in the youth league, considering the FIBA-length three-point line and overall sloppy play. More importantly, Johnson hit 37.7% of his catch-and-shoot jumpers (26/69), which is more indicative of his perimeter shotmaking.

His overall shooting numbers are incomplete — darn you, high school stat-keeping — but I have him at 41.2% from 3 (119/289) and 78.7% from the line (52/66) over the last two years, excluding junior-year free throws and with a clear asterisk on some shaky senior-year records (i.e., a very questionably-tracked and not-at-all complete 14-game “season”).

The modest free throw percentages suggest that Johnson is more like a good-to-great shooter than a truly elite one (most elite shooters are situated somewhere in the mid-to-high-80s), but that’s admittedly splitting hairs.

There should be zero doubt about his shot translating to the college level, where his role as a spot-up play-finisher on the wing is all but guaranteed. It will be more of the same, given his usage at lower levels. Johnson was effectively a four on offense while at Moon, with the team’s guards setting him up on spot-ups, off-screen jumpers, pick-and-pops, cuts, and occasional post-ups (e.g., turnaround fade-aways, face-up jumpers).

He saw more of the same as a senior, albeit in a muted fashion. Johnson played in a very limited role on a Hillcrest Prep team that featured Makur Maker, Mike Foster, Keon Edwards and Dalen Terry, all top-50 recruits in their respective classes. Johnson was relegated to standing in the corner while the ball-handlers operated, and, considering that the team’s guards and bigs preferred to create off the bounce, that meant Johnson stood in the corner a lot.

His usage as an off-ball scorer does speak to his strengths as a player — after all, his jumper is his best weapon — but it does speak to his limitations on offense, in terms of his ball-handling, burst, vertical explosion, flexibility, and functional strength. It isn’t so much that Johnson is averse to scoring inside the arc — he has solid touch on floaters and layups, his baseline jumper is solid, and he’s been lauded for his physicality throughout the offseason.

The issue is that scoring inside the arc is a laborious chore, made all the more difficult by his underdeveloped frame and lackluster athleticism. His handle is fine enough for transition run-outs and straight-line drives, but he lacks the requisite burst and strength needed to regularly turn the corner on his man. All too often, Johnson gets pushed off his trajectory and nudged into uncomfortable spots, even on plays designed to get him going downhill.

Johnson is quietly a very good offensive rebounder for his position and frame, tracking down misses and beating opponents to loose balls with a consistency that Roy Williams is sure to be fond of. But while he’s great at hunting down offensive boards, he’s much less effective at putting the ball in the basket off of those second chances, ranking in the eighth percentile on putbacks in EYBL play (5/17 FG, 0.619 PPP, 21 possessions).

Ultimately, Puff Johnson isn’t a player that will — or should — be tasked with creation duties at the next level, at least not for the next couple of seasons, barring unforeseen development. (Which is fine! There’s more than enough room on the team for a sub-elite shooter who can play without the ball.)

As of right now, Johnson falls into the “connective passer” category, functioning as a ball-mover out on the perimeter. There’s admittedly only so many of his games available on the internet, making it quite hard to get a full grasp on his playmaking aptitude (particularly at the grassroots level, where he had a larger role), but my viewing suggests that he’s just an average passer for his position.

He can be a bit left-hand dominant, making some possessions more difficult than they need to be — such as the following clip, where he eschews a righty bounce pass for an awkward runner — but he shouldn’t be in many scenarios at UNC where this will matter.

He’ll likely improve as an entry passer, a prerequisite for any Carolina wing, so he’ll likely be fine enough for his college role. Not great, but not bad. He’s used to playing within a team construct and deferring when needed, so his fit in UNC’s offensive scheme is rather clean.