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Fresh off the release of his seventh studio album, The Fall Off, J. Cole has already embarked on another journey — as a professional basketball player.
J.Cole Inks Professional Basketball Contract
J. Cole has inked a contract to play in the Chinese Basketball Association. For the Nanjing Monkey Kings. According to ESPN’s senior NBA Insider, Shams Charania.
“The multi-time Grammy award-winning and multi-platinum artist had committed to playing a few games for the Chinese team last year, and now follows through,” the insider wrote in a post on X on Wednesday (April 1)
In a post shared by Kurrco on X, the rap star said that he was “excited” about the opportunity.
Check out the clip below:
J. Cole has signed a contract to play in the Chinese Basketball Association with the Nanjing Monkey Kings 🇨🇳 pic.twitter.com/j6M9aUhKPU
— Kurrco (@Kurrco) April 2, 2026
Of course, fans had plenty of reactions about J.Cole’s announcement.
“J. Cole really said ‘from studio to stadium’ Bro dropped bars and now dropping bucket,” one user said.
“Put a band on Cole to drop 30 on the Taiwan Titans on the first game of the season,” a second user predicted.
“Rapper to pro baller… what can’t J. Cole do?” a third user chimed in.
Oddly enough, this won’t be Cole’s first time playing basketball professionally. Back in 2021, the rap star participated in the NBA’s Basketball Africa League (BAL). He spoke about his experience on Kevin Durant’s podcast, “The ETCs”. And noted that he often questioned if he was “good enough” to play professionally.
“When I was a kid, I wanted to play in the NBA, not just professionally, but to be in the NBA. But I was delusional. I didn’t have any reason to think that I would be in the NBA, but I definitely thought I was good enough. I was that delusional kid. It’s almost like I had blinders on, and I kept that delusion going,” Cole said on “The ETCs” in 2021 before his professional debut.
It will be interesting to see how he fares in his first outing.
