After being drafted first overall by the St. Louis Blues in the 2006 Entry Draft, defenseman Erik Johnson played one season at the University of Minnesota before making his NHL debut. He has competed internationally for the United States at multiple levels, most notably as part of the silver medal winning team at the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver.
Johnson spent the first two-plus seasons of his NHL career, with a knee injury costing him the entire 2008-2009 season in-between, with the Blues before being traded to the Colorado Avalanche in February of 2011. He earned the first All-Star selection of his career last season, while scoring a career-high 12 goals along the way, and the Avalanche rewarded Johnson on Tuesday with a seven-year contract extension through the 2022-23 season.