Raptors' Amir Johnson speaks from experience on NBA age limit
Amir Johnson is adamant that he was an answer on the long-running TV game show "Jeopardy!"
Johnson, after all, was the last player drafted from high school to the NBA – in the second round, No. 56 overall by the Detroit Pistons in 2005.
"You know that was on Jeopardy?" the now-veteran Toronto Raptor asked theScore in a recent interview. "Question for 500."
The following year, the NBA instituted the age limit of 19, ending the trend of high schoolers jumping straight to the league and effectively creating the one-and-done college phenomenon we see in the league today.
Commissioner Adam Silver is on record for being in favor of raising that age to 20, something vehemently opposed by National Basketball Players Association executive director Michele Roberts.
Unsurprisingly, Johnson agrees with his union leader and, as someone who has been through the process, he has some insight on the subject.
"I still think guys should have the choice to go (from high school)," Johnson said.
It's a sentiment echoed by players and that has unexpected support from the likes of Rick Pitino – the coach at Louisville, the school Johnson was committed to attending had he chosen the NCAA route.
"I had six young men commit to me out of high school that didn't go to college that went to the pros," Pitino told reporters over the weekend. "I'm very much for that because they didn't want college. They wanted to go to the NBA."
Johnson, one of those six, also put it as simply as his would-be coach.
"I wanted to go to the NBA," he said. "It was a different time when I came out, (when) LeBron came out in '03," Johnson added. "I was in the '05 draft. Certain guys were super-athletic and ready to go into the NBA."
Johnson wasn't one of those athletic wings like Gerald Green or Martell Webster, both of whom were taken in the first round of his draft and are still in the league. But he was a highly touted big out of Los Angeles and he credits his work ethic for developing into a starting NBA power forward.
"I think I would have been fine either way," Johnson said. "I was prepared to put the hard work in whether I went into the league or college."
His longevity in the NBA is what he's most proud of. The dynamic would have been totally different had he attended Louisville.
"Ten years man," he thinks out loud. "What's the average?" he then asks.
Informed it's less than five, he summarizes it simply.
"I think that's been a success."