Market Data 
Rashad McCants is best known for being one of the lead players of the 2005 North Carolina Tar Heels men’s basketball team that won the National Championship, but he’s making a name for himself on the entertainment side of things two decades later.
The 40-year-old spent four years in the NBA after he was selected with a first-round draft pick in 2005 by the Minnesota Timberwolves. The smooth scoring shooting guard made a name for himself while playing under legendary college basketball head coach Roy Williams, garnering an All-American selection after leading the ACC in scoring (20.0 points per game) during his sophomore season in 2003-04.
However, if you mention McCants’ name now, it’s associated with “Gil’s Arena” — the most popular current daily basketball digital show. Simply put, “Gil’s Arena” is named after former three-time NBA All-Star Gilbert Arenas. Arenas leads a panel of former NBA stars, including the likes of McCants, Kenyon Martin, Brandon Jennings and Nick Young while they debate the hottest topics in the basketball world.
What makes it stand out in a space that is littered with athlete-hosted shows and podcasts is its authenticity and how it’s unfiltered. In other words, it gives off the barbershop feel and the debate bounces back and forth between guys who aren’t afraid to go at one another — just as if they were still on the hardwood court.
“That’s the barbershop feel that we want to give back to the community,” says McCants in a one-on-one interview. “When people watch, they feel like they’re there. You can hear people in the comments talk during the show as if they’re there live. They’re talking to the TV, ‘Oh, that’s a BS take.’ That’s the energy we want.”
McCants — who says they all get competitive while they’re debating — says that authenticity during the show is what makes it great entertainment for fans.
“That element alone gives a great fanfare, it gives great fan engagement,” says McCants. “We get to play characters good enough for people who think that it’s real, like people think that we might have some type of energy against each other. As basketball players, we all have a job, and that’s to win. We’re all doing our part, playing our roles, and we’re being successful at it.”
Gil’s Arena isn’t just a podcast, it’s a studio show that is broadcast live on YouTube. The show began in 2023 after Arenas convinced McCants to partner up with him for a podcast after the duo would repeatedly run into each other at the 24-Hour Fitness.
McCants details how it was Arenas’ vision that led to the show being put together, saying how the former Washington Wizards star wanted to mimic popular NBA shows such as “Inside the NBA” and “First Take.”
“He’s been watching the whole First Take panel, Inside the NBA, and he wanted to mimic something like that, to give us all the freedom to speak the game,” says McCants of Arenas. “We took that and we’ve been able to elevate it to a point where now all of the athletes want podcasts. All athletes want a voice and to be able to talk about the sport. That’s the best thing that we could do to give back, is to give a voice to the athletes.”
It also doesn’t hurt that all five of the main characters on the show played during the same time period in the NBA during the 2000’s. Martin is the oldest at 47 years old with Jennings the youngest at 35 years old. However, each former basketball player on the show had their careers intertwine with one another.
McCants self-admittedly loves playing the role of “villain” and “controversial contrarian” on the show, saying that he gives a unique perspective from the side of people who don’t have the platform to speak.
“In the realm of competition, you want to be able to take it as heated as possible,” says McCants of the show’s format. “You want to be able to take it to the edge. You want to be able to cross that line just to get the win. You have to be able to hold your ground, hold your arguments. You have to be able to stick to your guns and hopefully somebody gives up before you do.”
The show has over 1 million followers. For perspective, the most popular basketball player-hosted podcast “All The Smoke” with Matt Barnes and Stephen Jackson — and the O.G. in that category, having started in October of 2019 — has just over 1.1 million followers on YouTube. Long story short, “Gil’s Arena” is right there with them.
According to McCants, the long-term objective of the show is to continue to grow the viewership, create longevity and eventually be considered on the same tier as “First Take” and “Inside The NBA.”
“The long-term objective is to reach as many people as possible and to forge a relationship with those people, to trust our takes, our opinions, our perspectives,” says McCants. “The long-form plan is to create longevity in this space where we can have seats next to NBA on TNT, Sports Center, First Take and we can be beside these guys and not have to be corporate.
“Independence is the number one beacon in this country,” McCants continues to say. “If we can take our talents off YouTube and away from linear viewership and create our own lane, I think we’ll see better results.”
