Over two decades ago, a considerably younger Vince Carter made his debut in the NBA with the Toronto Raptors. Now, he’s on the verge of breaking a NBA record when play begins this season.
VC will be the only player in league history to ever play 22 seasons, snapping his five-way tie for the record with Robert Parish, Kevin Willis, Kevin Garnett and recent retiree Dirk Nowitzki.
As a poetic way to bring us full circle, Carter arrived for Hawks media day on Monday in the shoes he originally made popular in the early 2000s — the Nike Shox BB4, right down to the actual OG Raptors colourway.
Is it okay to rep another team’s colours at your own team’s media day? Well, for most players, we’d imagine not, but when you’re one of the league’s elder statesmen like Carter is, you can probably do anything and get away with it. He’s Vince freaking Carter!
Nike is actually rereleasing this shoe in commemoration of Carter’s final season in the NBA, which will surely please those day-one Raptors diehards raised on the Half-Man, Half-Amazing dunks of old. Back then, VC entered this shoe into the culture, too.
It kind of works out perfectly too that for Carter’s last season, the Raptors are celebrating their own 25th anniversary season in the NBA by bringing back their original pinstripe jerseys, which Carter wore for a spell too.
We don’t know which games they’ll wear those jerseys for yet, but imagine Carter in his final game in Toronto, rocking the Raptors Shox against a team playing in the jersey he entered the league in. That would seriously be some kind of special.
h/t Twitter/NBAKicks
