At the beginning of April, J. Cole announced that he had signed a contract to play professional basketball in China for the Nanjing Tongxi Monkey Kings. While this was a bit odd since J. Cole is a 41-year-old rapper who just released his ‘final’ double album, The Fall Off, it wasn’t unheard of because Cole has played in the pros before and raps about his hoops dreams all the time.

On Saturday, April 11, J. Cole made his debut and to put it mildly, it was a bad joke. Cole went 0-for-5 on all three pointers, and he had one rebound and one assist in eight minutes of playing time. Besides four bricks, one shot was so bad that he hit the backside of the backboard in an embarrassing fashion. He also seemed to be walking a lot instead of running up and down the court like professionals are supposed to do. Now, this can be chalked up to nerves playing in a new country or the bright lights being on him since he’s a rapper playing in the Chinese Basketball league, but he did walk off the court to a standing ovation from the fans.

Then J. Cole quit.

On his social media, J. Cole posted a farewell/apology letter to fans saying that this loss was the only time he would be suiting up for the Monkey Kings this year. He blamed work visa delays in Hong Kong for delaying his games and now he had to get back to the US to start a tour. While he had a good time with his family in China, he ended the note by saying that he would be interested in coming back. "I told the team that if I could stay in shape, I would be down to play for a longer amount of games next year after I'm done with the tour. I'm wildin???? We'll see. DREAMER!"

While it’s cool to see a rapper up close and in person, we can only hope that the Monkey Kings don’t try this publicity stunt again because that’s keeping a slot away from someone who should be playing professional basketball in China.

Check out J. Cole’s shots below.