Vince Carter and Tracy McGrady are officially bringing one of basketball’s most recognizable bonds into the podcast space. The Hall of Famers and real-life cousins are launching a new weekly show titled “Cousins,” set to premiere January 28 as part of AMP Sports’ podcast network, according to the network’s announcement.
The concept is straightforward, and built on a relationship NBA fans have been watching for decades. Carter and McGrady rose in the same era, shared a team in Toronto, and became cultural shorthand for explosive athleticism at the turn of the millennium. Now they’re promising a show that blends current NBA breakdowns with stories from their playing days, plus guests spanning sports and culture.
In the release, Carter framed the podcast as a chance to add context to moments fans already know by heart, highlights that have lived online for years, but rarely with the kind of behind-the-scenes detail only the people inside them can provide. McGrady, meanwhile, positioned the show as something more intimate than the standard “two ex-players debate the league” format: a conversation between family members who experienced the same era from the inside, and who now want to “pull back the curtain” on what that life actually looked like.
The timing makes sense. The NBA is in a full-on nostalgia moment, old clips travel like new content, and the player-to-media pipeline has never been more powerful. But the Carter-McGrady pairing carries a different kind of appeal: it’s not an arranged partnership, it’s an actual relationship, with decades of shared history, overlapping careers, and the kind of blunt honesty that usually only exists off camera.
“Cousins” is being positioned as another tentpole property for AMP Sports as it grows its audio slate, and it will inevitably draw listeners who remember the Raptors’ early-2000s electricity as well as younger fans who know Carter and McGrady as legends first and humans second.
Either way, the pitch is clean. Two icons. One family. And a weekly window into an era they helped define, while they argue, laugh, and, if they’re true to form, probably remind the current generation that some things look different when you’ve actually lived them.
