This is the 2024-25 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →
Kent Johnson
Columbus Blue Jackets Center
Fifth overall in 2021, a hundred and seventy pounds, and forty-two games.
| Season | Team | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | PP | SH | GW | S | S% | TOI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2021-22 | CBJ | 9 | 0 | 3 | 3 | +2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 5 | 0.0 | 12:27 |
| 2022-23 | CBJ | 79 | 16 | 24 | 40 | -19 | 14 | 5 | 0 | 3 | 126 | 12.7 | 14:31 |
| 2023-24 | CBJ | 42 | 6 | 10 | 16 | -2 | 10 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 62 | 9.7 | 13:33 |
| 2024-25 so far | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Career | — | 130 | 22 | 37 | 59 | -19 | 26 | 5 | 0 | 4 | 193 | 11.4 | 14:04 |
This Season So Far
The 2024-25 season has not started. The empty row above is his, and both it and this paragraph fill in on their own from the morning after he first plays: what he has done, what it is worth against his own last season, and the run he is on when the two disagree.
Last Season
6 goals and 10 assists in 42 games — 16 points at 13:33 a night, minus-2, with 1 game-winner on 62 shots at 9.68 per cent, and 10 penalty minutes. A shoulder ended the season in January.
46.0 per cent of the expected goals at five-on-five over 475 minutes, the 24th percentile. His ice went 18-20 against an expectation of 16.52-19.38.
The Finesse Game
62 attempts at a median of 30 feet, with 21 per cent from inside 20 and 15 per cent from beyond 40, converting at 9.68 per cent.
The hands are the best on this roster and the passing is the reason he was taken fifth overall — he will attempt the play through the middle that a coach does not want, and it works often enough to be worth the ones that do not. 37 assists in 130 career games.
He does not shoot from the paint and he does not want to.
The Physical Game
6-0 and 170, and he is the lightest forward on this roster. He cannot win a puck on the wall, he is moved off the front of the net at will, and he avoids contact rather than absorbing it.
10 penalty minutes in 42 games and 26 in 130 for his career is one of the lowest rates in this edition, and it is low because he is never in a battle. The shoulder that ended the season is the second injury of a short career.
The Intangibles
Fifth overall in 2021, out of Michigan, and 130 NHL games and 59 points at 22.
He is one of nine top-ten picks on this roster. A 170-pound forward with genuinely rare hands is the hardest kind of prospect to place, and three seasons in he has not played sixty games in any of them. The tools are not the question; the body is.
The numbers underneath
On the ice
Five-on-five, 2023-24 · 475 minutes
- Expected goals
- 46%
- 24th pct
- Shot attempts
- 47.3%
- 29th pct
share of the chances while he was out there
share of the attempts while he was out there
Goals while he was on the ice: 18 for, 20 against. Expected: 16.5 and 19.4.
The eye and the numbers
HindsightThe report ranks him 22 points above where the numbers do. It was written for a back edition, with the seasons that followed already known. Neither the agreement nor the gap says anything about the eye, and this report is excluded from the club-level comparison for the same reason. Why the numbers land there sets out the club he did it on, the minutes he played and the men he played them with.
Both bars are percentiles among the 201 skaters in this edition with a report and enough ice time. The report bar ranks the mean of the grades above — 63 on their own scale — against every other report's mean. The numbers bar ranks his share of expected goals. A gap is a disagreement about where he belongs, not two scales talking past each other.
Usual linemates
2023-24 · 475 minutes at five-on-five
- Emil Bemstromnow PIT45%
Share of his five-on-five ice time spent alongside each player, measured from shift charts. Special teams are excluded: a power-play unit is not a line.
Why the numbers land there
Five-on-five, 2023-24
- The club
- CBJ took 45.9% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 46.0% — 0.1 above the club he did it on.
- The role
- Fourth line, 475 minutes at five-on-five — 16th percentile in ice time.
With and without
| Teammate | Together | Him apart | Mate apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cole Sillinger | 44.2% | 47.9% | 42.7% |
| Emil Bemstrom | 46.9% | 45.3% | 46.8% |
| Jake Bean | 46.9% | 45.6% | 42.6% |
44.2% together, 47.9% for him apart and 42.7% for Sillinger apart. He was better away from Sillinger, who was no worse away from him — the pairing cost him more than it cost Sillinger.
Expected-goal share while both were on the ice, and for each man in the minutes he played without the other. Apart is the pair subtracted from his own totals. It does not settle who was carrying whom — apart from each other, both were still playing with somebody — but it does say whether the share travelled when the pairing broke up.
Where he shoots from
goal on goal missed
85 unblocked shots in 2023-24, 6 of them goals. His median goal came from 30 feet. 21% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 15% from beyond forty.