Well yeah he improved throughout his career but he clearly was a very solid shooter in his 2 years here, more than just a garbage bucket getter. He didn’t just get “consistent minutes” - he was a key player, averaging ~10 and 7 and shooting nearly 40% from 3 (making 25 3’s his JR year and 25 again his SR year).
Respectfully, I don’t see any correlation between them and I don’t really see a “Hogue-like trajectory” for Watson had he gone JUCO. I think it’s perfectly fair to assess his development here in 2.5 years, and offensively he just can’t do much, and his offensive game hasn’t developed much. I don’t think there’s some alternate universe where he develops like Hogue and turns into a double figure scorer and good shooter. And that’s OK. He clearly has shown TJ in spurts he can make an impact on the defensive end.
That is quite the projection based on 35 minutes (Watson’s junior year playing time) and you clearly didn’t watch Hogue at IHCC.
Hogue wasn’t a better shooter his first two years. He barely took 3s and was little more than a cutter/finisher on a team that played little half court offense. Not a stretch to say Watson would have been similar in the same situation
At Iowa State as a junior Hogue played on a team that needed his defense and rebounding, allowing him to get a ton of minutes. That’s a big advantage in terms of developing and playing with confidence. Yet, he still only attempted 2 3P per game.
Hogue was 8/26 on 3Ps in conference play as a junior. It’s odd to make definitive statements of Watson not being similarly capable, after only 35 minutes of playing time this year. Watson could go 8/26 if we needed him to play 500+ minutes in conference. Fwiw, Watson is 4/9 in 345 career Big 12 minutes
It’s very likely Watson would be better having consistently played his first 2.5 seasons, but he’s already similar to Hogue as a junior, just on a better team.
