Johnson Embracing Leadership Role

Saturday, January 21, 2023

Brisbane Bullets import Tyler Johnson has opened up on having to adopt a leadership role this season for the younger Bullets players.

Brisbane won its second game in a row on Thursday night with a 106-101 win against the Adelaide 36ers.

As a result of their wins this week against the Phoenix and Sixers, the Bullets have snapped a long losing streak and have rediscovered some positive vibes at the backend of the season.

Johnson led the way on Thursday night with 27 points but says his impact is felt beyond the stat sheet.

“It’s been a while (since I’ve been a leader). I don’t think that in my NBA career I really had to be a leader,” Johnson said.

“For me it did take a little bit of soul searching and a little bit of self-check to be able to do that, you can’t just come in and worry about yourself and getting yourself right for games because when you have young guys, you need them to help you and you need to help them for them to help themselves.”

Johnson played over 350 games in the NBA and compared the differences of not having to adopt any leadership traits in his NBA stint, to now acting as a mentor.

“I had to be held accountable and I had to do things the right way and I had to come in and do my job. But as far as being vocal and as far as setting an example with my words and my habits, and outside of playing hard and doing things for myself that would help the club, now I’m put in the position where I have to be more of a mentor,” Johnson said.

“This is one of the first times in my basketball career outside of college eight or nine years ago where I had to have this kind of responsibility.

“I wish we could’ve figured this thing out sooner but at the same time I’d rather have these conversations now as far as guys coming together and guys making those steps that will help their career now as opposed of not having them at all.”

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">The Brisbane Bullets are certainly making a nuisance of themselves to those teams on the fringes of finals basketball ?<br><br>Re-live the best bits of their overtime win against Adelaide here ? <a href="https://t.co/dlu7E4q3ah">pic.twitter.com/dlu7E4q3ah</a></p>— NBL (@NBL) <a href="https://twitter.com/NBL/status/1616193921469583375?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 19, 2023</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

The Bullets are not holding back as they go head-to-head with the Illawarra Hawks on Saturday, after the Hawks shocked the NBL world with a game-winning half-court shot by Tyler Harvey on Thursday against the New Zealand Breakers.

Johnson admitted stepping into the Hawks’ home arena will be quite intimidating as he marked the Hawks as “dangerous”.

“When teams have their back against the wall or feel like there’s no expectations they can be dangerous, we used to call them trap games when I used to play in the league,” Johnson said.

“You play a team that is not really playing for much and the come in and play with freedom, next thing you know you look up and you’re down 15-20. So, we’re treating these games as if we were in a playoff push.”

Tip-off on Saturday between Illawarra and Brisbane is 5:30pm AEDT.