Marcus Watson is A Basketball B-Movie
OSU’s highly touted four star recruit is rough and unpolished but also bluntly efficient — which may be all the Cowboys need this season.
When you commute to New York from Connecticut, the Metro North is many things: safe haven, time waster, and an excuse to stream all manner of strange movies. Which is why I, Norwalk resident, have seen Avengement, a gritty British action thriller starring Scott “I Was Sort Of Deadpool” Adkins. You may wonder what this has to do with Oklahoma State’s four-star point guard recruit Marcus Watson; I swear to you I’m getting there.
Here’s a wild scene from Avengement:
Did you get through it? I wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t! It’s a gaudy and ugly bit of filmaking, one which draws its lifeforce from wooden boards being smashed straight onto bad guys faces; you can practically feel them splintering through skin. I’m not always in the mood for b-movies like Avengement but their essential to cinema’s survival, being a low-risk investment for both financeers and audiences. No one really hates a graceless powerhouse — in action movies or basketball. And where the latter’s concerned, a little bit of brutal skill can really bolster roster construction.
See, there’s a guy on every team who saddles up and gets the job done: they’re rarely soaked in star power; their highlight reels underwhelm. But once you realize how often they punched a key shot in or rallyed the crowd through a nasty slam, you suddenly love that guy. I’m talking Horace Grant. Danny Green.
And maybe — just maybe — Marcus Watson.
(I told you I was getting there.)
Behold:
Two places in this potpourii of footage where Marcus Watson is “that guy”:
0:33 — Watson hovers at the three point line and clearly thinks about throwing it down. He then says “screw it” and shoulder-slashes his way towards the hoop. The shot goes up; it doesn’t take. But Watson’s drawn the foul and, more than that, decided a nonchalant putback basket is the play here. His Catch & Release is smoother then Jennifer Garner’s. The ball floats up…nothing but net.
This is a swagger play. The and-1 doesn’t count for anything and is a tremendously difficult shot; Watson attempts and sinks it anyway. He doesn’t make a point of showboating that fact (his is a humble display of power) and, yet, the lesson is clear — Watson can ball.
The Cowboys need ballers. Last season was a trailer for better days to come, a series of occasionlly strong performances from players like Yor Anei which rarely led to winning finishes; they lacked for confidence and consistency. Watson’s game has both. Though his jump shot is still a bit spotty, the Chicago native’s assured play should promptly bolster the Cowboys tenacity. And that’s a prerequiste for success in a Big 12 Conference which sent four good teams to the Dance last year.
But that’s not all.
1:18 — Marcus Watson, burgeoning ‘that guy’, lays it down over a defender. The defender’s soul leaves his body.
This is Watson’s Avengement moment. It’s not that the slam is savage (it would probably rate a 0.5. on Shea Serrano’s Disrespectful Dunk Index…); it’s sleek and serrated — like a blade to the face. It doesn’t linger. You almost have to watch it on repeat to know it actually happened.
You can’t belay an offense to that dunk, but you can deploy it sneakly. Defenses shirk from a super-sized point guard, and Walton has a college-ready frame that will force frustrated coaches to assign him larger defenders — the kind that he should blow by for two if they ever foolishly overcommit. This is NCAA basketball, so this shoud happen at a rapid clip. That’ll open paint opportunities for Cameron McGriff and lanes for Thomas Dzigawa, who all but buried the TCU Horned Frogs last year.
I don’t want to pretend Marcus Watson is Cade Cunningham, the current apple of OSU’s recruiting eye. But Cade Cunningham is an MCU movie, the kind of blockbuster few can invest in year after year much less land. So forget The Avengers — it’s Avengement time now. Marcus Waston is B-movie basketball. Prepare to love his brand of brutal athleticism; pray he leaps to the A-list big leagues (like Scott Adkins did to Doctor Strange.) Weirder things have happened, often in Stillwater.
It’s time to get weird.
It’s time to go Watson.
