Leafs' Fourth-Round Pick Exceeding All Expectations So Far This Season

Selected by the Leafs with the 120th pick in this past entry draft, Johansson was surprised he was even drafted and admitted at development camp that he felt the Leafs may have drafted him too early. Johansson was the second surprise of the draft following their first-round pick of Ben Danford. However, it appears as though the Leafs were right to use a fourth-round pick on the slender, 6'1 defenseman.

In 34 games last season with Leksands IF Jr., the 18-year-old had 8 points. Through 10 games this season with Leksands, he already has 13 points and has added more sandpaper to his game as well with 47 penalty minutes already, compared to the 20 PIMs that he amassed all of last season.

Johansson is a long-term project for the Leafs and certainly needs to add some weight to his frame as he is only listed at 165 pounds currently, but the early returns for the Leafs are promising. Leafs' assistant general manager, Dr. Hayley Wickenheiser, was impressed by what she saw during rookie camp and even compared his skill set to another Swedish defenseman and former Leaf, John Klingberg.

It's still early, but the start for the young Swede has been tremendous and much more productive than anyone was expecting. Here's hoping he can maintain this. It would certainly be quite the development for the Leafs.