Stephon Marbury Transforms Toys 'R' Us into Indoor Sports Complex
The Toys “R” Us sign has long gone dark on Flatbush Avenue, but the cavernous shell it left behind is about to get a very different kind of kid-at-heart energy.
Stephon Marbury is coming home to help light it up.
The former New York Knicks point guard and Coney Island native is partnering with Wellball to transform the long-abandoned Brooklyn big-box store into a sprawling indoor sports complex, anchored by a new game that wants to do for hoops what pickleball has done for tennis.
Pickleball courts will sit alongside other paddle-sport setups, flag football space and, at the heart of it all, dedicated courts for Wellball—a stripped-down, shooting-only twist on basketball that cuts out the dribbling and the defense and turns every possession into a duel.
The building has sat idle since Toys “R” Us shut its U.S. stores in 2018. If this plan lands as intended, it becomes Wellball’s Brooklyn flagship and one of southern Brooklyn’s most significant indoor recreation hubs. An opening date has not yet been announced, but the intent is clear: turn a retail relic into a year-round playground.
Wellball leans into the one thing almost everyone loves about basketball: putting the ball in the air.
Billed as “the pickleball of basketball,” the game stages head-to-head shooting battles. Players fire over “The Well,” a device mounted on the rim that shapes how shots are taken and how the game flows. No dribbling. No closeouts. No full-court sprints. Just accuracy, rhythm and nerve.
The format strips away size and speed advantages and hands the spotlight to touch and technique. Because rounds are quick, games turn over fast, keeping players of different ages and ability levels constantly involved rather than stuck on the sideline waiting for a run to end.
“Everybody wants to shoot,” Marbury said in an interview with Scoop B. “Wellball, I believe will be the next… the next wave of how people are able to compete and still do something that they love to do.”
The sport is the brainchild of Omar Wellington, a former Division I player at Sacred Heart University who built a second career training athletes from youth hopefuls to NBA names, including Rick and Jalen Brunson. His work on the development side shaped a game that rewards repetition, focus and form—skills that translate cleanly back to traditional basketball.
Marbury hasn’t just lent his name. He has captained in Wellball’s VIP league and become one of its loudest advocates, a two-time NBA All-Star throwing his weight behind a format designed to lower the barrier to entry while keeping the competitive edge sharp.
For him, the Flatbush project carries more than business appeal. It’s personal.
Marbury grew up in Coney Island, starred at Abraham Lincoln High School and then, from 2004 to 2009, ran the point for the Knicks at Madison Square Garden. Now “Starbury” is set to plant a different kind of court in his old borough—this time not as the hometown kid on a poster, but as the driving force behind a space where the next generation can chase the same feeling every shooter knows: ball in hand, eyes on the rim, everything else fading away.
