Add Cam Johnson to the list of cornerstones the Suns need to pay

Deandre Ayton isn’t the only young cornerstone the Phoenix Suns need to worry about paying next summer. As much as Cam Johnson is going to be a represent a hefty amount on their inevitable luxury tax bill, he’ll be worth it for their short- and long-term future.

Thursday night’s game against the Oklahoma City Thunder provided the latest example of why it’ll be so important for Phoenix to dive into that luxury tax like Scrooge McDuck. In just 24 minutes off the bench, the 25-year-old wing racked up 21 points — one shy of his career high — and 9 rebounds, all while going a perfect 7-for-7 from the field, including 5-for-5 from 3-point range.

This isn’t just the angle of one opportunist writer, however; as we covered in detail a few weeks ago, Johnson’s been quietly providing value off the bench for weeks now.

“He’s been playing well for awhile,” head coach Monty Williams said. “I’ve said this a number of times that we look at Cam as a starter, to be able to bring a guy off the bench who can shoot like that but also attack the basket and go to the other end and defend. He puts the work in, and he’s more than a shooter.”

Over his first 10 games of the season, though, some were legitimately questioning whether Cam Johnson was a good shooter. At the time, he was averaging just 6.5 points per game on 33.3 percent shooting, including 31.7 percent from downtown. It didn’t help that he was coming off a season in which his 3-point percentage dipped all the way to 34.9 percent.

But outside of that first 10-game stretch to start this season, and a disastrous stretch to close the 2020-21 regular season where he went 15-for-76 (19.7 percent) while playing through a wrist problem that eventually shut him down until the start of the playoffs, he’s looked the part of a purebred sniper.

And through every rough patch that shooters are bound to experience from time to time, the Suns have remained resolute in encouraging, expecting and outright demanding that he continue to shoot.

“I just know he knows he’s gonna get yelled at if he don’t shoot the ball,” Chris Paul said. “Everybody on our team gon’ be pissed if he don’t shoot the ball, ’cause he is seriously one of the best shooters in this league and one of the best shooters I ever played with.”

“He’ll get on you intense,” Cam Johnson said of Paul whenever he’s turned down shots. “At one game, he said, ‘If you gotta shoot 17 of ’em, shoot 17 of ’em!’ And that goes for a lot of guys on the team.”

The numbers back up the support his teammates and coaching staff give Johnson. Before that dismal stretch to close last season, he was shooting 39.4 percent from deep. As a rookie, he made 39 percent of his 3s. In college, he made 40.5 percent of his triples. During last year’s Finals run, he posted the fourth-highest true-shooting percentage in NBA playoff history, going 44.6 percent from beyond the arc. And ever since that rough 10-game start to this season, he’s shot a scorching 46.8 percent from downtown on 6.0 attempts per game.

Johnson is fourth on the Suns in scoring over that 21-game stretch, trailing only Devin Booker, Deandre Ayton and Chris Paul.

“Man, when Cam Johnson shoots, that thing is going in,” Ayton put it succinctly. “I’ll just tell you that. It’s such a perfect form at 6’8″, and we see him work on it all the time, him and Mikal [Bridges].”

Johnson has now scored in double figures in 11 straight games. He was already turning his 3-point percentage around before Booker’s absence, but there’s no question he seized the opportunity in front of him with Phoenix’s superstar shooting guard out.

In that eight-game stretch without Book, Johnson bumped up his numbers pretty significantly compared to his averages for the season as a whole thus far:

• Season averages: 10.7 PPG, 4.1 RPG, 24.3 MPG, 44.1 FG%, 43.1 3P% (5.4 3PAs)
• 8-game stretch w/o Book: 14.5 PPG, 5.3 RPG, 30.2 MPG, 45.8 FG%, 45.5 3P% (6.9 3PAs)

“You could see him going that way before Devin got hurt,” Williams said a few weeks ago, before Booker’s return. “The shot, the playmaking. I mean, he’s playing with a different group, and I think he’s getting used to it now. He’s got Landry [Shamet] out there and JaVale [McGee], so I think that may have contributed to it, but he works on his game. The thing that I don’t want is him — any of our guys — backing off. Because I think it’s just gonna make it better for our team when we get everybody back.”

Booker has been back for three games now, and Johnson has scored 12, 14 and 21 points in those contests, shooting 17-for-30 from the field and 11-for-19 from deep. His knack for hitting back-breaking 3s certainly hasn’t been lost on his teammates either.

“It’s always like that with him,” Chris Paul said. “I think I told him that a few games ago, it’s always like he’s sort of always hits that dagger, that 3 to put the game away. Say we’re up six and it’s two-and-a-half minutes left, he hits the 3 to put us up nine. I think that’s just preparation. You prepare for those situations so you’re ready for ’em.”

According to NBA.com, Johnson is currently in the 92nd percentile on spot-ups this season, and he averages 6.4 points per game on catch-and-shoot looks — the 13th-highest number in the NBA, despite playing 3-7 fewer minutes on a nightly basis than each of the 12 players ahead of him on that list. Just the the threat of his shot provides the NBA’s eighth-ranked offense with much-needed floor-spacing.

His numbers will always be somewhat limited by his bench role and the offensive options in front of him, but Cam Johnson could be an X-factor for this team in the playoffs. His 3s serve as the straw to break opposing camels’ backs, and if he can build on his exemplary debut playoff run last year, the Suns will remain incredibly dangerous when defenses key in on Booker and CP3. Turning to him, Bridges and Ayton looks far more attractive this year than it did last time.

So if the Suns continue on their upward trajectory toward title contention, they had better be prepared to pay up for not only Ayton, but Johnson as well. That will require a financial sacrifice on ownership’s part.

Phoenix already has $124 million on the books for next season — without including Abdel Nader ($2.2 million team option) or JaVale McGee, Frank Kaminsky and Elfrid Payton (unrestricted free agents). The Suns can and will go over the $119 million salary cap to re-sign their own players, but with the luxury tax threshold looming at $145 million, a new deal for Ayton pushes them there by itself. Every dollar spent on an extension for Johnson, even if it wouldn’t kick in until the 2023-24 season, comes with potential luxury tax implications.

And yet, that’s the sacrifice that championship-caliber teams make to keep a good thing going. By the time a potential extension for Johnson kicked in, Jae Crowder, Dario Saric and Abdel Nader would be off the books. Trading Landry Shamet down the line is another way to alleviate some of that salary-cap pressure. Chris Paul’s deal is only partially guaranteed for $15 million in 2023-24, Cam Payne’s deal is non-guaranteed that year, and with a new TV deal incoming in 2025, the salary cap will spike again here soon.

So whether it’s a rookie-scale extension this summer or restricted free agency in 2023 for Johnson, the Suns need to be fully committed to the financial blow it’ll take to keep their 25-year-old sniper around for the long haul. He’s quickly proven his value on both ends of the floor, becoming a young cornerstone on a Suns squad that will be hoping to sustain its newfound prominence for the foreseeable future. Great teams pay to retain talent, and if the Suns don’t pay up for Cam Johnson in the next year or two, someone else will.