First, on the court: as Chris McCosky notes in his blog, Flip Murray didn't exactly do Johnson any favors running the point on Friday night:
But finally, Amir Johnson got a chance to play 12 straight minutes. Finally, a chance for the kid to get some work. So what happens? Flip Murray decides to hog the ball. They never ran a single play for him. The only time Johnson touched the ball was when he got an offensive rebound. That's ridiculous. Flip Saunders should have -- and maybe he did afterwards, I don't know -- scold Murray for that. It was selfish and pointless. Murray's next contract isn't going to be based on numbers he puts up in garbage time.
This is mostly true (and I agree with the sentiment), but the first time Johnson touched the ball was actually a turnover: he had a crisp pass from Murray bounce off his hand and go out of bounds. Looking at the play-by-play, it seems the turnover was charged to Murray, but it certainly seemed like Johnson simply wasn't ready for it and I wouldn't be surprised if that stuck with Murray in the back of his head. I'm not saying that it makes it right, just that there may have been another reason than Murray simply being selfish.
Second, off the court: as A. Sherrod Blakely reports, Johnson missed the team flight and had to fly commercial:
He had some car problems heading to the airport, and wound up missing the team plane bound for Seattle.
I know this because when I boarded my flight to Seattle, Amir's face was literally the first one I saw.
"Car problems," he said after I gave him a "Kid, now what happened?" kind of look.
McCosky was on the same flight, and reports that Johnson blew a tire on the way to the team flight. He had to pay his own way and will be fined, but it seems there won't be any other punishment.