The NBA and NHL field more pairs of brothers, but no league outshines the NFL when it comes to superstar siblings.
From the Mannings to the Kelces to the McCaffreys and beyond, there is a long and ever-growing list of family surnames that have become gold standards in the NFL, both on the field and off.
The success on the gridiron is easy to follow. It makes sense that J.J. Watt and T.J. Watt have both earned Defensive Player of the Year awards — they share the same genetics. The same could be said for Super Bowl champions Peyton and Eli Manning or Jason and Travis Kelce.
But many of the NFL’s famous brother tandems are also superstars without their cleats — whether they’re cracking jokes on a podcast or entertaining audiences in a television studio or selling soup in a big-budget ad campaign.
T.J. and J.J. Watt, along with former NFL fullback and third brother Derek, have been all over television screens this month in a “Home Alone” inspired commercial for Dick’s Sporting Goods. Eli and Peyton Manning reinvented the “Monday Night Football” broadcast with their laid-back “ManningCast,” while Jason and Travis Kelce leveraged their “New Heights” podcast into a $100 million distribution deal this year.
Baseball has had its share of marquee siblings in the past, but not even the DiMaggio clan of the mid-20th century or the Ripkens of the 1990s had the kind of stranglehold on audiences today’s football-playing brothers have.
“The thing that’s unavoidable at the crux of it all is their personalities,” said Lisa Delpy Neirotti, a sports management professor at George Washington University. “People succeed if they have some sort of funny point to them or this natural connection. These brothers have that.”
American audiences are increasingly drawn to the league’s brothers as the NFL continues to cement itself as the country’s dominant cultural force.
Sibling rivalry
The genetic component of brotherly success is obvious. If one child in a family has the genes to become a top-tier athlete, it only makes sense that their sibling would reap the same benefits.
It doesn’t hurt that athletic fathers often foster those traits in their children — especially their sons. Before they became Super Bowl-winning quarterbacks, Peyton and Eli Manning grew up around NFL locker rooms, while their father, Archie, played for the New Orleans Saints in the 1970s and ’80s.
Washington Commanders wide receiver Luke McCaffrey and San Francisco 49ers running back Christian McCaffrey had a similar up-close and personal look at what a football life meant — their father, Ed, caught passes from Hall of Fame quarterback John Elway as a member of the Denver Broncos in the 1990s.
Christian McCaffrey hit the league first, winning an Offensive Player of the Year award while his younger brother finished his collegiate career at Rice.
“I looked up to my older brother so much. It was cool not just to follow in their footsteps but to bond with them over it,” Luke McCaffrey said. “That brought me joy and taught me the brotherhood aspect of team sports at a young age.”
No one who reaches the pinnacle of their sport will say they had an easy path, but there are benefits to following in familial footsteps.
“Everybody battles through different things in their life. Having people who have gone through a similar thing shows you the sort of recipe for that,” Luke McCaffrey said. “How to overcome things, how to trust the process, how to enjoy playing the game.”
The McCaffreys and Mannings have the added benefit of an NFL network to support them. The fathers became wealthy in the league and had the know-how and financial ability that a typical parent might not be able to offer.
In other industries, they might be derided as “nepo babies,” individuals who succeed in the same field as their parents by leveraging those professional connections.
“Having a father who’s been an NFL player is a huge inside track because you know what coaches are looking for,” Delpy Neirotti said. “People will look at your kid and you can afford — because you have the money — the best training.”
Even players who don’t have NFL fathers stand to gain from a competitive upbringing. NFL wide receivers Amon-Ra and Equanimeous St. Brown learned to love the off-field work from their father, former Mr. Universe John Brown.
“His biggest impact was teaching us the discipline that it takes to make it to the professional level, the dedication that it takes and the mindset you need to have,” said New Orleans Saints receiver Equanimeous St. Brown, the oldest of three brothers.
But a football-focused family offers more than just a genetic advantage.
Having a training partner to hold them accountable while growing up is invaluable, NFL siblings say. Working alongside someone with the same background and the same goals makes it easier to get in the gym, study film and devote extra time on the practice field.
“We could both train together. We have the same routine, same schedule,” Equanimeous St. Brown said. “Just like in bodybuilding, they have a gym partner they go with to push one another.”
For former defensive backs Jason and Devin McCourty, the NFL dream started early — as did the preparation. During their Pop Warner days, the pair would wake up early on Saturday mornings to go over plays, throw the pigskin around and fantasize about what could be.
The competitive nature that eventually carried them to the NFL manifested in ways that didn’t always appear helpful to outsiders.
“Me and him would be in full-blown arguments in offseason workouts in the summer where we didn’t think the other one was working hard enough; we’d be yelling and screaming,” Jason McCourty said. “Our coach would often tell us to shut up in the huddle because we’d be arguing with each other if the other guy scored on us.”
Those arguing teammates eventually won a Super Bowl together as members of the New England Patriots in 2019. They were just getting started.
Off-field icons
Childhood experiences transcend individual sports, but the NFL’s superstars are parlaying their on-field success and familial bonds into media opportunities that their counterparts in the MLB, NBA and NHL rarely match.
The NBA’s Ball family — featuring father LaVar and brothers Lonzo, LiAngelo and LaMelo — have made the biggest push with their own six-season reality show, “Ball in the Family,” and the “Big Baller Brand” shoe line, but their national relevance has faded over time.
The reality show, which aired on Facebook Watch, last aired in 2020. LaMelo Ball moved away from his family brand by signing a $100 million deal with Puma before the 2020 NBA draft.
Meanwhile, the NFL’s family ties seem to bloom perennially.
Years removed from their playing careers, the Manning brothers parlayed a combined four Super Bowls into a handful of shows at ESPN with their own production company — Omaha Productions. Add a regular rotation of commercials from Toyota and Allstate, and the pair are a staple of NFL broadcasts every Sunday.
The Kelces are hot on their heels, though. Their podcast, aided by younger brother Travis’ highly publicized relationship with pop superstar Taylor Swift, has become unavoidable in NFL circles on social media.
Jason Kelce sprinted into retirement this year with a slew of his own commercials and an upcoming late-night show on ESPN.
“It enhances the joy and the love that you have for the game because it makes it bigger than the sport,” Luke McCaffrey said of these brotherly enterprises. “The other aspect is that it makes it easier from a marketing standpoint; you have two different audiences that can form into one.”
The McCourtys have known for years that they had that joyful connection. When they were both members of the New England Patriots living in the same neighborhood in 2018, they capitalized on that natural rapport to start the “Double Coverage” podcast.
“It just started to kind of happen. We were always doing things in that arena,” Jason McCourty said, noting their own local radio and TV productions. “It just made so much sense to do it and go for it.”
The idea was a hit, paving the way for the duo to transition to broadcasting careers after they hung up their cleats. Jason McCourty is an analyst for ESPN and calls games for CBS Sports, while Devin McCourty works the pregame, halftime and postgame shows for NBC’s Sunday night offerings.
The pair will work together on Netflix’s Christmas Day NFL broadcasts on Wednesday.
“It’s been incredible,” Jason McCourty said. “I just think the bond that we have and the ability to be honest with each other, it resonates with people.”
The Kelces joined the podcasting world four years after the McCourtys, quickly becoming one of the most listened-to sports shows on platforms such as Spotify.
The St. Browns started their own show two months later, and while they haven’t matched the rousing success of “New Heights,” their show has still found an audience and produced a handful of viral clips.
“The opportunity to become popular and to get into media is very low,” Delpy Neirotti said, especially when players become staple members of a given team. “That stability allows you to build up a strong fan base and recognition within a team community.”
The most successful programs, she said, will feature top players. Coincidentally, the age of the podcast coincided with the age of uber-talented brothers in the NFL.
In the four major North American sports, there is only one pair of brothers in a Hall of Fame — MLB’s Paul and Lloyd Waner.
The NFL could shatter that mark in the next decade. The Watt brothers look like shoo-ins for the NFL Hall of Fame in Canton, as do the Kelces. Peyton Manning has already received his gold jacket and Eli Manning is a semifinalist for the 2025 class.
On-field excellence is good for business, according to Jason McCourty.
“For Devin and myself, kind of being captains on our teams, starters throughout our careers and then being on the same team brought a lot of notoriety to us,” he said, noting that the name recognition translated into off-field opportunities.
The podcasts are also benefiting from the same concept that made the Mannings’ alternate broadcast on “Monday Night Football” a hit: people love the laid-back nature of two brothers shooting the breeze.
“I think it’s just the brotherly banter, the s—- talking. We’re kind of funny sometimes, so people like that,” Equanimeous St. Brown said. “The more you know somebody, the more real the conversation is. And I’ve known my brother my whole life.”
Resonating relationships
The business angle of these multimedia projects isn’t rocket science. The NFL is a juggernaut controlling TV ratings with an iron fist with an ever-expanding schedule. The Christmas Day slate features the league’s third and fourth Wednesday games since 1948.
It’s all supply and demand — according to Delpy Neirotti — and the demand for NFL content is still growing.
With brothers from different teams, the podcasts double their fanbases. Fans who cheer on Travis Kelce and the Kansas City Chiefs can embrace the same content as those who cheered on Jason Kelce when he played with the Philadelphia Eagles.
It also doesn’t hurt that in today’s media landscape, there are more niche opportunities than ever before. Sports fans used to frequent the same sources for their news and highlights — ESPN, the major cable networks or newspapers. Now, there are a seemingly infinite number of podcasts, blogs and social media analysts who are each carving out their own niche followings.
“There’s a lot more inventory that allows a lot more opportunities to become known,” Delpy Neirotti said. “Everybody’s social media channels are the first step. Then people support you in a podcast. Then you go on to other things.”
The impact goes beyond that, though. More than 80% of Americans have at least one sibling: a sister who they grew up tackling in the backyard or a brother they watched sports with.
“You can relate. Being a kid and playing alongside your brother and imagining, ’Hey, I want to do that,’” Jason McCourty said. “Or even as a parent, when you’re seeing how the Kelces get along. They can be different personalities, but when they come together, you see the uniqueness and specialness of that bond.”
That bond is front of mind for many football fans during the holiday season. Whether their own sibling bonds are as close as the McCourtys or Mannings, millions of Americans will reflect when they see NFL brothers on Christmas Day.
“People want to be close to their siblings,” Delpy Neirotti said. “You either have that relationship or you want that relationship.”
