FPD shortstop Keon Johnson ready for next level — and a championship

Keon Johnson was 9 when he stood in City Hall in front of the Macon-Bibb County Commission.

“I tried out in Dallas — Dallas, Georgia,” he said on a video back in 2017, his mother Sheena by his side as he addressed the commission.

Johnson had tried out for the USSAA All-American showcase and was picked for the regional all-star team to play that August at ESPN’s Wide World of Sports Complex in Orlando. 

Back then, the Alexander Magnet II student was considered among the best young players from Georgia, Florida and South Carolina. He was being recognized by the city for that accomplishment.

Now? Throw in the other 47 states and all sorts of countries, and Johnson is still among the best as his senior season at First Presbyterian Day wraps up.

Not that you’d have any indication of that when watching or listening to him.

To sit with Johnson for nearly 30 minutes as practice commences in front of him is to sit with somebody who doesn’t act, talk or sound like the average teenager — or the average elite athlete. Johnson is polite and personable, maintains eye contact and fulfills his part of a conversation with thoughtful answers and a quick smile.

There’s no indication that he is a superstar.

“I would say in a word he’s ‘grateful,’” FPD head coach Greg Moore said. “We got through playing at John Milledge, and there are four or five kids standing at the gate outside the visitors’ dugout trying to get his autograph.

“It’s just become part of the scenery of what’s going on in our baseball program, and it’s a great thing. This is a guy that’s still working with young kids, teaching them how to hit on the weekends.”

Some parents of the youngsters holding a Keon Johnson autograph — and there are loads over the past few years — may want to hold on to that paper, considering the kind of future that may be ahead.

Granted, the only thing Johnson is thinking about is ending this season with a win. Others, whom he politely doesn’t pay much mind to, are more focused about down the line with perhaps the best baseball prospect ever in Bibb County and one of the best in the area.

There are playoffs awaiting, and a state championship to be won.

“I’m just trying to end it the best way possible,” said Johnson, who went 2 for 4 with 2 RBIs and a homer Monday night in FPD’s regular-season finale, a 10-2 win over Covenant. “Dogpiling in Statesboro, winning state.”

That journey doesn’t begin for the Vikings until May 15, when the top seed in GIAA Class 4A hosts the winner of Strong Rock vs. George Walton. A win there, and either Athens Christian, Tattnall or Tallulah Falls is next in the semifinals.

Lurking as the No. 2 seed is Brookstone, which has vanquished FPD in the last two state title series, one in Macon at Luther Williams Field and one in Columbus.

Looking ahead is inevitable.

“We’ve been on the side of losing twice, and we’re trying to climb Everest,” Johnson said. “That’s what it feels like, at least, just because we played the same team in state twice, just couldn’t get it done.”

There’s staying focused, and there’s paying attention to college baseball and the SEC.

Johnson signed in January with Vanderbilt, having just watched videos at the ceremony of Commodore coaches rave happily about who they hoped would be their starting shortstop for a few years.

They can’t wait, considering Vanderbilt is having an un-Vanderbilt-like season, below .500 in SEC play and a little above .500 overall.

No matter what happens in July with the Draft, he’ll have a huge decision. Barring injury, that professional career isn’t going anywhere. But he’s also aware that one is of college age only once, and three years at Vanderbilt would put him on track for a degree from an elite school.

“I can’t go wrong either way, to be honest,” said Johnson, equally non-plussed about the scores of individual records he’ll depart with. “I’m either going to be playing for Tim Corbin and all the guys that I honestly play around during the summer — so I know them — for three years and get better and go be a first-rounder. Or I can wait it out, see what the draft’s going to do this year and still potentially could be a first-rounder and take that route.

“There’s no bad option.”

Of course, he can’t get too cocky about that academic rep at Vandy. Older brother Ishmail is in the Air Force, currently stationed in Las Vegas.

“He’s like a wizard,” Johnson said with an ever-so-slight tone of a defeated younger brother. “He’s insanely smart. … He’s like, with all the wizards and the smart ones. I say ‘the smart ones,’ not like I don’t have a 3.8 GPA or 3.7 myself, but he’s that intelligent.”

Ishmail took his mother’s last name and Johnson his father’s, but Keesha Wingo is a single parent who has taken on breast cancer three times and has two children making her proud.

“She is 62, believe it or not,” Johnson said with pride. “And she does not look 62. She used to joke that she’s old enough to be some of my coaches’ grandma.”

Not that she actually fits that role. Mom is at every game, manning the Gamechanger video camera, and taking in the joy her youngest plays with and shares with others.

After games, he talks with little kids while signing autographs. He talks to adults with ease, too. Sometimes, it’s as if he doesn’t quite grasp his impact with others.

“I think that’s a fair assessment,” Moore said. “But he’s well aware of what’s going on. There’s a lot of expectation out there. We’ll go anywhere from five to 20, 25 scouts per game.

“So, he’s very well aware of what’s going and what’s happening, but he has done such a really good job at enjoying every step along the way and having a good time with it.”

Being grounded, above and beyond the level of someone much older than he is, makes a big difference.

“Keon’s played all over the world, all over the country,” Moore said. “He’s been everywhere. He played with different teams in the summer and just done all kind of things.

“But to this day, he will still tell you his favorite baseball to this point in his life has been on his high school baseball team.”

Among the things that stands out to Moore is how Johnson — involved in assorted community-service groups — improved every year, in one form or another. Now, as a senior, his defense at shortstop is on par with his offense.

Thankfully.

“My freshman year, I had 11 errors,” Johnson said with a slight cringe. “I was throwing it over the dugout my freshman year. I was hitting the top. It was bad.”

Nobody’s ducking any more. He and big buddy Brady McHugh at second base are having a dream senior season on the dirt.

“Me and our second baseman have turned some sick double plays,” Johnson said. “Me and him have been infield partners since seventh grade.”

Johnson is one of several Vikings who have signed to play college baseball. McHugh is headed to East Tennessee State, Conner Strandmark to Mercer, Wyatt Waters to Augusta.

Many Vikings have been partners for a while.

 “Since about probably 10 years old,” Johnson said. “We’ve all played against each other. We’ve played with and against each other forever.”

Thus, the only thing on his mind besides graduation is joining the other Vikings in a delirious dogpile three weeks from now on the infield at Georgia Southern’s J.C. Clements Stadium.

He’ll have six weeks after that to worry about his long-term future, hoping to spend that time smiling as a state champ with a group he’s been a part of since fifth grade.

They’ll need to keep each other chilled a little throughout a postseason that’s taken awhile to get here, and one that has had particularly unhappy endings the last two years.

Erasing some of the past pain has blocked out Johnson’s thoughts of a bright future.

“We all love each other,” he said. “Playing for the name on the front rather than worrying about your number on the back. We don’t even have our last names on the back.

“At this point, right now, as we’re speaking, it feels like it’s taking forever to get to the playoffs because we’re on a (24-game) win streak, and we’re just … We want the ring so bad.”