Cam Johnson woke up on Wednesday morning immersed in his own thoughts, wondering where in the cosmos they might take him. Four days before the NBA playoffs, it would be easy to let work flood his brain as he lay in bed. The buzz of anticipation for his most meaningful basketball in three years surrounded him.<\/p>\n
But Johnson knows himself well. He knows that indulging his curiosity helps him find peace. So he indulged.<\/p>\n
Today\u2019s topic was time dilation.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo gravity, time and speed, they work together,\u201d he explained a few hours later, wiping the sweat from his forehead after the Nuggets finished practice. \u201cSo the faster an object goes, the slower time is perceived. To my little extent of knowledge, there\u2019s like a meter. And at the speed of light, at the top of the meter, there\u2019s no space for time in there. Time basically comes to a stop. So a particle of light that\u2019s traveling at the speed of light, it doesn\u2019t really feel time. If light takes eight minutes to get from the sun to us, that\u2019s from our perspective. Everything\u2019s about perspective. For that particle of light, it\u2019s instantaneous because of its speed.\u201d<\/p>\n
Johnson was off and running. He referenced the 2014 science fiction movie \u201cInterstellar,\u201d in which Matthew McConaughey and Anne Hathaway age 7 years for every hour that passes on a different planet. He tied it to a more microscopic real-life example \u2014 that \u201can astronaut who worked in the International Space Station for X amount of time might age a couple of milliseconds slower than a human on Earth.\u201d He marveled at the brilliance and imagination of Albert Einstein and other early 20th-century physicists who studied relativity before it was accepted as a theory. \u201cYou\u2019re thinking, how did they figure that out?\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The 30-year-old Nuggets wing is a half-decade removed from an NBA Finals run with Phoenix. He hasn\u2019t had a taste of the playoffs since 2023, when his Brooklyn Nets were swept in the first round. As Denver\u2019s starting small forward alongside the star duo of Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray, he\u2019ll be an X-factor for a team with championship ambitions this year. He\u2019s widely regarded as one of the smartest players in the NBA, an avid student and teacher of the game whose comprehension of the chessboard made him seem like a perfect match for Jokic when Denver traded for him last summer<\/a>. His mind is one of his greatest strengths \u2014 and sometimes his adversary. \u201cI\u2019m probably an overthinker on a lot of things,\u201d he told The Denver Post.<\/p>\n The Nuggets sacrificed a first-round pick and a longtime staple of their starting lineup, Michael Porter Jr., to acquire Johnson in a transaction that also enabled other additions<\/a>. It was their most significant roster move in four years, a clear signal from Denver\u2019s new front office that change was needed to return to championship form. The old core wasn\u2019t working anymore.<\/p>\n Nine months later, the trade has aged better for the Nuggets in the abstract than it has on the stat sheet. They anticipated that. Porter and Johnson flipped roles. Porter\u2019s expanded. Johnson\u2019s contracted. His season has been a rollercoaster at times, interrupted by injuries and shooting slumps and the overall adjustment process to playing in Jokic\u2019s orbit. His teammates and coaches have implored him to be aggressive, not to scale back too much.<\/p>\n \u201cCam is a really cerebral player,\u201d coach David Adelman said. \u201cAnd I think cerebral people sometimes can get in their own way. \u2026 It\u2019s my job to make sure he\u2019s getting touches, that he\u2019s part of what we\u2019re trying to accomplish. And it\u2019s his job to just play. Let it happen. He\u2019s too good of a basketball player not to.\u201d<\/p>\n Johnson nonetheless finished the year a career-best 43% from 3-point range, ranking eighth in the league. He\u2019s coming in hot to the playoffs, where Porter struggled in recent years. The coming weeks will provide the real verdict on Denver\u2019s 2025 offseason moves. Johnson is no stranger to the environment and the pressure. He has his own way of navigating it all, of harnessing his tendency to overthink as a recalibration method. A reset button.<\/p>\n When he needs space away from basketball, he puts his mind to work on another subject that brings him as much joy and wonderment. He goes to space.<\/p>\n \u201cI just try to learn things and learn about the world around me,\u201d he said. \u201cWhen we talk about astronomy and physics in general, as an overthinker, it kind of gets you outside of yourself. You get caught up in your own problems sometimes and the world feels like it\u2019s this big and everything feels so heavy, and then you go and you learn about some things, and you\u2019re like man, we are really just on a little tiny rock in a very vast abyss.\u201d<\/p>\n Johnson is entranced by physics. By history. By the history of physics. He takes books on the road with him \u2014 postgame reading for the tireless hours the Nuggets spend airborne, traveling from NBA city to city.<\/p>\n It has served him well throughout this season and his seven-year NBA career. It will continue to offer him a form of respite during the playoffs, which begin Saturday (1:30 p.m. MT) when Denver hosts the Timberwolves in Game 1.<\/p>\n \u201cMy whole world sometimes revolves around what happens in this rectangle,\u201d he said. \u201cSo I need the opposite.\u201d<\/p>\n It doesn\u2019t always show, but Johnson is driven by a competitiveness that matches his intellect. Growing up outside of Pittsburgh, he watched his older brother become a high school valedictorian.<\/p>\n \u201cHe always said that he was gonna catch Aaron,\u201d his dad, Gil Johnson, said. That made life simple: Cam got good grades because he had no other choice.<\/p>\n He also applied his smarts to every sport he played. As a quarterback in football, he didn\u2019t need to wear a wrist sleeve with plays listed, Gil said. He had a knack for knowing where his receivers were going, where he needed to place the ball. As a baseball player, he once pitched a strong game for his seventh-grade team, then surprised his dad by explaining exactly how he did it. He didn\u2019t have an elite arsenal of pitches \u2014 he was a middle schooler, after all \u2014 but he figured out which areas of the strike zone were weaknesses for each hitter throughout the game. \u201cI had no idea that he thought baseball like that,\u201d Gil said.<\/p>\n And as a hooper, Johnson was always trying to identify the next pass his teammates could make, after he passed it to them.<\/p>\n \u201cYou saw the leadership. You saw him telling guys where to be,\u201d said Nick Luchini, one of his high school friends and teammates. \u201cYou could tell that guys were feeding off how smart he was.\u201d<\/p>\n In a parallel universe, Johnson might\u2019ve been an engineer. He might\u2019ve studied astronomy, or history, or law. But he decided when he was young that he would make it to the NBA. While playing up a couple of years in second grade, he impressed an opponent once and earned a postgame compliment: \u201cYou might be a professional basketball player someday.\u201d<\/p>\n Johnson didn\u2019t take it that way.<\/p>\n \u201cHe came over with a scowl on his face,\u201d Gil said. Cam was offended by the \u201cmight be\u201d part of the comment.<\/p>\n \u201cI remember it like it was yesterday,\u201d Cam said. \u201c\u2026 I feel like a lot of kids think that, you know? And it didn\u2019t always work out for me. You say that to me in ninth grade, I\u2019m like, \u2018Yeah, we\u2019ll see.\u2019 Of course, I have confidence in myself, but as a 5-8 freshman, it\u2019s like, I\u2019m also studying. I\u2019m into books too. \u2026 By the time high school got to late junior, early senior years, I unloaded some of my APs intentionally. And kind of spent just a little bit more time in the gym, took a little bit of that (schoolwork) off my plate. So that was probably the first time I made a decision where school was a little bit more on the back burner.\u201d<\/p>\n After all, Cam had already lost the battle to his brother. He would end up a measly salutatorian.<\/p>\n \u201cHe got me,\u201d Cam said. \u201cHis GPA was higher than mine. He took more APs. He did better on AP tests. He did better on the ACT. He did better on the SAT. I couldn\u2019t catch him. He\u2019s too smart. \u2026 He\u2019s just smarter than me, point blank. Period.\u201d<\/p>\n By the time he hit a growth spurt and became a recruiting target for Division I college basketball programs, Johnson was already explaining physics terminology to his high school friends to help them understand a challenging class.<\/p>\n \u201cIf I\u2019m being honest, Cam taught me a lot,\u201d his friend Santino Platt said, \u201cdumbing it down for me.\u201d<\/p>\n But Johnson said it wasn\u2019t until a sophomore astronomy course at the University of Pittsburgh that he developed an insatiable curiosity about the mysteries of the universe. And the miracles of scientific discovery within that universe. Amateur astronomy became a hobby as he was drafted into the NBA.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have such a mathematical approach to solving so much of what we cannot see,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cIt\u2019s really cool how we use these equations and constants to deduce how far a planet is from a star that\u2019s 50 light years away, you know what I mean? We can\u2019t see it for nothing. But by measuring how much light it takes away from a star and how big that star is, we can figure out a lot. When you read about the history of it and how long we\u2019ve been around as humans in the past thousands of years, and how rapidly it\u2019s changing, it makes you think, \u2018Well, what do we have wrong now?\u2019 So I just like reading. Reading what people have thought in the past, reading what people think now. We have some really smart scientists in the world, and some are really really good at explaining.\u201d<\/p>\n He came face to face with one of them in 2023, when the Nets helped arrange for him to meet astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. After a long conversation, Johnson and Tyson recorded a \u201cspace draft\u201d video for social media<\/a> in which they took turns selecting celestial concepts and events. Johnson\u2019s \u201cteam\u201d included the carbonate-silicate cycle, Pluto and a neutron star with the first overall pick. \u201cThat\u2019s a good pick,\u201d he told The Post, doubling down.\n<\/p>\n He beamed at the display of public interest in NASA\u2019s recent mission to the moon. He wondered to himself if the miracles of science are taken for granted by most people as he watched, in awe of the flight path\u2019s precision. (\u201cWe go around the earth, loop to catch the moon, loop the moon, come back to the immediate, right where we want to be, drop them right in the ocean right where we thought they would end up. That\u2019s what math can do for us. \u2026 Not a stationary earth. Not a stationary moon.\u201d)<\/p>\n His favorite reads over the years have included \u201cA Short History of Nearly Everything\u201d by Bill Bryson and \u201cThe Planet Factory: Exoplanets and the Search for a Second Earth\u201d by Elizabeth J. Tasker. Recently after some Nuggets games, he\u2019s been working his way through \u201cThe Fabric of the Cosmos: Space, Time, and the Texture of Reality\u201d by Brian Greene, which dives into the weeds of theoretical physics.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s sometimes a little heavy to read after a game,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cLike, you\u2019ve gotta really sit there and think on a couple pages. It\u2019s not, like, a light read. But that\u2019s the whole point. Sitting there and thinking. It\u2019s pretty cool if you ask me.\u201d<\/p>\n He has his other ways of unwinding from basketball, too, of course. He\u2019s an avid golfer. He\u2019s a lifelong sneakerhead, his dad says. And he\u2019s a practicing Christian \u2014 but he doesn\u2019t view his religious and scientific convictions as being at odds with each other.<\/p>\n \u201cI think we choose as humans to put them in opposition to each other,\u201d he said. \u201c\u2026 If everybody always thought, like, \u2018God is in control of everything, I don\u2019t need to worry about it,\u2019 I don\u2019t think we would have as much scientific (discovery). You can look throughout time, and history tells us this. \u2026 I really think the two can mesh. And that\u2019s the perspective I look at it from. I just look at it as creation and the laws of nature are God\u2019s language, and we are slowly trying to uncover it in a way that we can understand. It\u2019s like translating languages.\u201d<\/p>\n While seeking out texts that make the complex feel digestible, Johnson has simultaneously established himself as a purveyor of intricate concepts. He hosts \u201cThe Old Man and the Three,\u201d a prominent basketball podcast that was originally hosted by JJ Redick. Redick left the show when he took over as head coach of the Lakers. Johnson has been his successor, having various Nuggets teammates join him for episodes throughout this season.<\/p>\n The conversation doesn\u2019t usually get around to astronomy. Johnson is wary of boring his friends to death with it \u2014 though he has found at least one space friend with the Nuggets in team doctor Steve Short.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ll sit here and explain it, and some of my friends have no interest in it. And they\u2019re nodding their head, nodding their head. I\u2019m rambling. And then \u2014 eye-roll,\u201d Johnson said, laughing. \u201c\u2026 I\u2019ll get a lot of eye-rolls for sure, like, \u2018Here he goes. He don\u2019t even know what he\u2019s talking about.\u2019 \u2026 I wonder how many other NBA players think about this stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n Johnson got off to a rocky start in Denver.<\/p>\n He began the season in a nasty slump. A 39% career 3-point shooter, he was 21% after 11 games, good for only 7.2 points per night. Not ideal for a player who had averaged an efficient 18.8 the previous year in Brooklyn.<\/p>\n But the Nuggets were winning. Johnson\u2019s struggles didn\u2019t get in the way of their overall offensive success. Adelman urged patience from fans and media as Johnson navigated his new solar system, one in which Jokic is the sun. The first-year coach defended Johnson again during another rut in early March, after he missed a potential game-winning 3-pointer in Oklahoma City<\/a>. It weighed heavily on him.<\/p>\n \u201cHe puts a lot of pressure on himself \u2014 not sometimes, but all the time,\u201d Gil said. \u201cHe holds himself up to a high standard.\u201d<\/p>\n But for most of the season, Johnson has been a quietly effective role player, defending better than Porter and keeping defenses honest with his floor-spacing, even when he hasn\u2019t scored. He found his mojo again over the last few weeks, highlighted by a barrage of clutch 3s in a statement win over San Antonio. Johnson rarely celebrates or gets animated on the court, but that day, he shared a cathartic moment with sharpshooting teammate Tim Hardaway Jr. after draining a big shot in overtime. It was the emotional apex of a 12-game win streak to finish the regular season.<\/p>\n Since those first 11 games, Johnson is 46.8% from deep. The Nuggets have a 9.5 net rating with him on the floor.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re all telling him to shoot,\u201d Hardaway said this week. \u201cIt would be different if we were telling him to pass, right? So we\u2019re telling him to do what he does best, man. Be that Brooklyn Net Cam that you were out there, averaging 17, 18 a game. Playing freely, playing fun. That\u2019s what you were brought here to do. Knock down your shots when open and be confident. Don\u2019t be passive.\u201d<\/p>\n The ball will find him in high-stakes situations over the coming weeks. The gravitational pull of the Jokic-Murray two-man game is too intense, like a planet where time is dilated. Defenders will be sucked in from the perimeter. Johnson will get open shots.<\/p>\n When he\u2019s in those moments, nothing else matters to him \u2014 no other galaxy or solar system or planet. His universe contracts into an 18-inch cylinder.<\/p>\n\n \u201cBasketball is a beautiful game,\u201d he said, \u201cin terms of just the creativity and expression of competition. \u2026 On the court, I like to just be in that moment and respect it as that.\u201d<\/p>\n Only when the moment is over does the universe expand again, waiting for Johnson\u2019s imagination to explore it. To him, there\u2019s something profound about being able to appreciate the scale of both things: the basket and the abyss.<\/p>\n \u201cIt changes my mental state,\u201d he said. \u201cYou\u2019re in an environment of high competition and the pressure of competition, where you feel like every shot is so important. I\u2019m shooting a ball into a hole, you know what I mean? It\u2019s a floating circle, and I\u2019m trying to get a ball into it. I just like to kind of minimize those things when I step off the court, give my mind something else to focus on.\u201d<\/p>\nOne of the brightest minds in the basketball universe<\/h4>\n
![\"Nikola](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.denverpost.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/TDP-L-NUGGETS-MAVSA03_2524x.jpg?fit=620%2C9999px&ssl=1\")
![\"Cameron](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.denverpost.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/TDP-L-NUGGETS-MAVSA03_0990x.jpg?fit=620%2C9999px&ssl=1\")
Finding his mojo in Denver<\/h4>\n
![\"forward](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.denverpost.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/TDP-L-NuggetsVsSpurs-20260404-TH-013.jpg?fit=620%2C9999px&ssl=1\")