Marshall Henderson’s basketball career, for all intents and purposes, is over. So is the fame and idolatry that came along with it, mostly at Ole Miss, but also beyond.

Because Henderson craves attention like a drug (a problem given his own well-documented history with actual drugs), he was always likely to use social media as a way to get what he seeks.

On Monday morning, that led him down a path that ends in him being called a bigot.

“Boycotting sportscenter til this michael sam nasty (expletive) (expletive) is off .... My brothers are 7 and 11 and saw that!!! #SICKENING,” Henderson Tweeted. “Im sorry, but I DO NOT AGREE WHATSOEVER that should be shown to where innocent eyes can see!!!”

There are a number of problems here, first of which is a stunningly dense world view for someone with the good fortune of being educated at three separate universities and one junior college. I also wonder if he was worried about his siblings when he decided to flip the bird to that LaSalle fan, or the number of stories that were written about his use of cocaine and marijuana.

Watching a gay man just drafted into the NFL kiss his boyfriend does not seem worse.

There’s also the fact that Marshall Henderson is Ole Miss basketball, and vice versa. The university that defended him time and time again no longer can, because it’s already had its fair share of LGBT issues this year. And no one at Ole Miss is even really in position to help him make decisions, and by that I mean tell him what to do.

In fact, Ole Miss athletics director Ross Bjork — a man who has routinely had to defend Henderson during the last two years — did anything but support Henderson soon after the tweets went viral.

“I’m extremely disappointed,” Bjork tweeted, “... We use significant resources to educate our student-athletes about respect & dignity for all people & unfortunately not everyone gets it.”

That leaves a 23-year-old Henderson on his own, with no one to answer to. The NBA has never really been interested in 6-foot-2 shooting guards who can’t play defense, handle the ball and make only about a third of their shots; when you add in a drug problem, none are interested. Henderson’s future is in Europe, though anyone who watched him the last two seasons wonders how he would do in a culture where he was not mythologized and coddled. In the meantime, Henderson will play in $500,000 winner-takes-all tournaments with other “Remember him?” guys and plot his next tweet. He’s moved right past trying to be famous for playing basketball. He’s more like Kim Kardashian with a buzz cut.

Henderson almost immediately claimed his tweets were actually for a gay friend’s psychology class experiment. When it was quickly pointed out that Ole Miss’ finals were last week, the same for many colleges, Henderson told that his still-gay friend is actually considering coming out to his family and friends and wanted to measure reaction. Because like most of us, this friend makes life-altering decisions based on the 69,405 people following Henderson.

It’s not funny, though. It’s sad. In two years of covering Henderson as close as anyone else, I never got a true feel for who exactly he was. When he wanted to be, Henderson could be charming and introspective. He could sign autographs for kids for hours, and make everyone feel like Oxford was his home and Ole Miss was his family. He could also be angry and defiant, refusing to go out of his way for anything or anyone. I suppose we all have moments like that, but Henderson could be both in a five-minute span. That’s unusual.

Last summer, USA Today Sports asked me to write a long feature for its college basketball preview magazine about Henderson, before his July suspension had even happened. We stuck with the story even though it was uncertain whether or not he would actually play (guessing correctly that Ole Miss would ultimately give him a slap on the wrist), but I decided to write more about the possibilities for the future than how many 3-pointers he would make as a senior.

I openly wondered what would happen if the storybook ending did not happen, and Henderson did not permanently change for the better. Because once Henderson is not in uniform, all he is proving to be is another uninformed idiot with a lot of Twitter followers. It’ll only be so long until the latter is no longer true, and is it still #WhiteGirlWednesday if no one is paying attention?


Rebel without a pause

Marshall Henderson’s antics on and off the court since 2009:

May 2009

• Using counterfeit money, Henderson, then a high school senior, and a friend buy marijuana. He pleads down to probation.


• Transfers from Utah to Texas Tech, but after sitting out a transfer year, he decides to transfer to South Plains Junior College in Texas.

January 2012

• In the midst of a season where he’s named juco player of the year, he violates probation by, among other things, failing drug tests. He spends 25 days in jail before attending Ole Miss.

March 2013

• Henderson is named the SEC tournament MVP, but generates more headlines by being photographed drinking in a local bar, arguing with the fake account of a Kentucky player on Twitter and using both middle fingers towards an opposing fan after Ole Miss’ loss in the NCAA tournament.

July 2013

• He’s suspended indefinitely from Ole Miss after failing multiple drug tests. Two months earlier, he had been pulled over by Oxford police with trace amounts of cocaine in his car. He tweets to Fox Sports’ Erin Andrews that she’ll be the first person he mocks upon his return.


• Henderson’s suspended three games for the failed drug tests, and is suspended from use of social media during the season. He averages 19 points a game, sets an SEC record for consecutive games with a made 3-pointer and is named second team all-conference.


• Henderson tweets Monday that he’s boycotting ESPN’s SportsCenter because of its coverage of gay NFL player Michael Sam, later claiming it was for a friend’s psychology experiment.