INTEL: Recruiting update on five-star AJ Johnson
Five-star point guard AJ Johnson burst on the scene over the summer. Really it was after his showing at the Pangos All-American Camp in June. In our next update, he rose to be a top-15 player in the country, and the industry followed suit.
Johnson is now the No. 15 player in the industry-standard 2023 On3 Consensus. The 6-foot-5 point guard has taken two official visits, LSU and Texas. He has spoken about visiting Louisville for their Louisville Live, the Cardinals’ version of midnight madness. He canceled visits set to Southern California and NC State; no dates have been rescheduled for either yet, but Johnson says he plans to reschedule with NC State.
Johnson’s recruitment
AJ Johnson told On3 at USA Basketball that he was planning to sign late. He cited that he wanted to see each of the teams play and get a feel for their systems.
There is a lot going on with the five-star point guard’s recruitment. In sifting through it all, the biggest question on hand is, will he make the Louisville visit? If Johnson does come for Louisville Live, then they should be considered a player in this recruitment. The writing is on the wall that Louisville will miss with DJ Wagner, and they would like to take a point guard in this class. Johnson has been their top option for a while, and Payne has let that be known.
However, until Johnson takes that visit, Texas has done a lot to climb to the top of Johnson’s list. For starters, they have proximity to Houston, which is where Johnson’s close friend Jalen Green plays for the Rockets. Johnson’s long-time trainer, who is also Jalen Green’s trainer, also lives in Houston.
All the intel coming off Johnson’s 9/10 visit to Austin was also very positive; words and phrases like high-level, knocked it out of the park, and as good as it could have gone were used coming off the weekend.
While intel suggests Texas is ahead of LSU at this time, he visited LSU, and one thing he has consistently talked about this the development of Ja Morant from that stuff, but, at the end of the day, will that be enough?
At this time, sources close to the situation would not consider Southern California or NC State factors at this point. Johnson has also brought up programs like Arkansas and Gonzaga recently coming in contact. If he does, in fact, sign late, there could be some time for them or other programs to develop standing. However, as of this writing, neither has offered, and no visits are set.
The other big question is, will Johnson wait until late to sign as he has indicated?
Sources indicate, as of pressing publish on this piece, that Texas feels confident about where things currently stand. But watch to see if Johnson shows up to Louisville live on October 21; they could become a player.
One last note
Professional league options are still looming in the background on this one. Johnson has spoken at length about his relationship with ‘his brother’ Jalen Green. Green was one of the first players to go the G-League route, and he ended up the No. 2 pick in his NBA Draft.
Johnson is an industry-standard On3 Consensus five-star prospect, and one that some say may have as much pro upside as any player in the class. The pro route remains a very viable option for Johnson in this process.
Something to watch for is that even if Johnson commits to a program, that does not necessarily squash the pro option.
On3s Recruiting Prediction Machine
AJ Johnson has not set a date for his commitment or really even indicated much of a time frame. However, he has taken visits to LSU, Texas, and has said he plans to attend Louisville Live this weekend.
Recruiting can change at a moment’s notice. But as of this writing, On3s Recruiting Prediction Machine (RPM) gives Texas an 30.2 percent chance of landing the five-star point guard.
The On3 engineering group teamed up with Spiny.ai to create RPM, the industry’s first algorithm and machine learning-based product to predict where athletes will attend college. Starting from the ground up, On3 built an entirely new product that utilizes data, human expertise, and machine learning.