Rashad McCants never minces words, and his latest take might be one of his realest yet. Appearing on the No Limit podcast, the former NBA guard delivered a raw, unfiltered look at just how impossible it is to make it in the league and how unfairly narrow the Hall of Fame conversation can be.
“1 out of 16 million make it to the NBA. We one of 5,000.”
“So what happens to the people who not 475 Hall of Famers that should be getting some type of notoriety just for playing in the game? We touch the floor, it’s legendary just to be a part of this s**t. We all a family, right? We know the body of work is biased ’cause you thinking about opportunity.”
“You play more minutes, you got a better chance of making it to the Hall if you good enough. But I always look at it like, yo, I look at Deron Williams and Boozer just getting a jacket. Michael Redd just got a jacket. But that’s because they played on the Redeem Team.”
“Jamal Crawford didn’t get a chance to play on the Redeem Team, he don’t get no jacket. You think he’s not Deron Williams when it come down to the game of basketball? There’s a lot of guys that were good, just didn’t get opportunities to get there. So it’s like, why we all can’t get some of this s**t?”
For McCants, the point wasn’t self-pity, it was perspective. The numbers he quoted put the dream of making the NBA into context: there are over 8 billion people worldwide, yet fewer than 5,000 have ever worn an NBA jersey since the league’s founding in 1946. That means even being the 12th man on the bench places you in one of the most elite circles in history.
McCants knows this from experience. Once a college star at North Carolina, where he helped the Tar Heels win the 2005 NCAA championship, he was drafted 14th overall by the Minnesota Timberwolves. He played parts of five seasons in the NBA before injuries and off-court issues derailed his career. But as he pointed out, even that short stint put him in a category that almost nobody reaches.
The “jacket” McCants referred to is the Hall of Fame honor, symbolic of basketball immortality. To him, it’s not always about who was better, it’s about who was seen. Players who got the right breaks, landed on the right teams, or were part of major international moments (like the 2008 Redeem Team) often end up remembered more fondly than equally talented peers who didn’t.
McCants’ comments hit at a broader truth: fame in basketball doesn’t always match skill. For every superstar who defines an era, there are dozens of great players who never got the spotlight, whether due to injuries, politics, or simply bad timing.
It’s a question that resonates deeply across generations of former players. Many who make the NBA never become stars but still dedicate their lives to a game that forgets them the moment they’re gone.
McCants isn’t asking for sympathy, he’s demanding recognition. Because, as he sees it, making it to the NBA is already a Hall of Fame-level achievement. Out of millions chasing the dream, just stepping onto an NBA floor puts you among the 0.00006 percent who ever do.
So while the world celebrates legends like LeBron James and Michael Jordan, Rashad McCants wants people to remember the other names, the thousands who fought their way into the league, even for a season.
And that might be the most brutally honest statement ever made about what it really means to “make it” in the NBA.
