Ben Johnson's masterful play-calling for Detroit Lions is like a comet in the sky

A comical but telling moment Thursday at the end of Ben Johnson’s weekly news conference said a lot about his success and his skyrocketing stock as a future head coach.

After the Detroit Lions' offensive coordinator was done fielding questions, which were mostly about his play-calling wizardry that has produced 76 points in two weeks, he began to walk off the podium before he briefly posed his own query.

“No Tampa questions, huh?” he said with a big smile. “That’s a good defense, guys.”

Yep. And when the Lions hang 30 on the Bucs, we’ll be sure to ask about what happened to that “good defense.”

Johnson’s smile said it all. Because he knows what reporters know. We aren’t really asking about offense and play-calling. We’re watching the football equivalent of Halley's Comet pass through Detroit briefly, lighting up our sky with all those points on the scoreboard, with the added pleasure of joyful creativity.

You don’t have to be an astronomer to enjoy the celestial majesty of a comet and you don’t have to be a Lions fan to enjoy Johnson’s masterful and marvelous imaginative production.

I get flak from readers whenever I mention Johnson is as good as gone after this season. It’s basically the football equivalent of the Peter Pan Syndrome — fans just don’t like being reminded of the pain that comes with maturity.

Of course, any reasonable fan understands good teams lose their coordinators. What needs to be underscored, however, is the uncommon occurrence we’re experiencing while watching Johnson at work. So I would suggest following some old advice: Don't cry because it's over, smile because it happened.

And hold on to that smile, because we might not see another play-caller like Johnson in Detroit before Edmond Halley’s dusty ball of celestial ice returns in 2061.

Look, I think Dan Campbell is a great coach. But he got lucky with Johnson. He was right under his nose the whole time, even while Campbell still hired the train wreck that was Anthony Lynn at offensive coordinator. Even after he promoted Johnson, he still didn’t officially give him full play-calling duties for months, until the 2022 season started.

So it’s fair to say Campbell didn’t recognize the genius who stood directly before him. That doesn’t bode well for Campbell finding the next genius. Then again, Campbell is also wiser and more experienced now and should already have a working shortlist of replacement candidates.

But that’s the future and if the Lions make the kind of playoff run everyone is expecting, it’s way in the future. We’re talking late January and possibly even February. (Yes, I'm going there.)

So let’s enjoy Johnson in the moment. It was fun probing him Thursday about the inspiration for his play designs. He recently said a referee in training camp drew up a play he might use; last week against Carolina, we were treated to Frank Ragnow’s direct snap between Jared Goff’s legs to David Montgomery that resulted in a first down, borrowing a look from rookie offensive lineman Colby Sorsdal's FCS-level team.

But the reverse flea-flicker touchdown was the highlight — so fun and effective that it inspired Kyle Shanahan to use it later that night with the 49ers. What do the cool kids say? Game recognize game?

A gleeful Taylor Decker found Johnson on the sideline after the play and called him a “sicko,” which may or may not be an upgrade over D.J. Chark calling him “a little evil genius” last year.

So I decided to let the man speak for himself Thursday and asked him how he describes his own play-calling style. He took a deep breath and chose his words carefully.

“Calculated,” he said. “I guess that’s one way to say it.”

Then he gave his assistant coaches credit for contributing to a collective effort. According to Fox’s broadcast Sunday, Johnson has 120 to 140 play calls available each week and uses about 68 of them. Johnson said his staff comes up with about 12 new ideas each week but only two or three are used.

But the key to making it happen is Campbell, who sees the game the same way Johnson does and gives him the latitude to make the calls.

“And truthfully that’s the wonderful thing about our head coach,” he said, “is he’s not afraid to go ahead and do some things that maybe haven’t been done before in this league.”

One of my favorite things about Johnson is his grasp of the big picture and the way he casually slipped in the underpinning to his strategy and play design. It’s the boring stuff he credited his players with understanding. It’s the boring stuff terrible coaches like Rod Marinelli used to bring up all the time.

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Johnson is smart enough to understand the boring, fundamental stuff is an intrinsic part of football that he doesn’t need to constantly remind reporters or fans about. He only brought it up Thursday to explain the foundation for all the fun plays.

“So all the tricks, all the creativity,” he said, “we couldn’t have it if we’re not playing with good pad level, if we’re not securing the ball properly, if we’re not looking to knife after catch the ball, those types of things.

“They’ve embraced that and because they have that allows us as a coaching staff to push the limits.”

This has been a fun ride with Johnson steering the offense. His orbit is still overlapping with Detroit's for a while longer — enjoy it while you can.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Ben Johnson's play-calling for Detroit Lions shooting across our sky