DC rapper about $20M short of $20M goal to bring Kevin Durant home

Paper routes just don’t pay like they used to, I guess.

Maryland-based rapper Paperboy Prince, a diehard Washington Wizards fan named for his days delivering local newspapers in suburban Prince George’s County, is trying to raise $20 million to lure free agent star Kevin Durant back to his hometown — a goal relayed to the masses by The Washington Post.

In two days, Paperboy Prince has raised all of $52. Not $52,000. Fifty two dollars.

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In a beyond-bizarre rap Paperboy Prince calls, “The song that’s driving the movement,” he drops such lines as, “Hey, Kevin Durant, you got to come to D.C., man, you already know this life. It’s home. C’mon, we’ve got some chicken for you. We’ve got your favorite food. I got some pizza for you, here in D.C.”

Maybe folks aren’t supporting the cause, because they realize the Wizards can (and would) pony up far more than $20 million to bring Durant home. But you don’t think Paperboy Prince has thought of that?

“We love KD, we’ve seen him since his days as a high schooler in the DMV at Montrosse Christian,” Paperboy Prince wrote in a spellcheck-free statement on his cause’s GoFundMe page. “Now, our guy is an NBA superstar, possibly one of the greatest players on the planet. He loves DC, he named his shoes after PG County, he loves spending time here in the offseason and listening to GOGO. He wants to Come back to DC but he cant unless we show that we love him! Imagine having KD, John Wall, Bradley Beal, and a new coach next season! The Wizards are on the way! Thats why Paperboy Prince of the Suburbs deemed by The Washington Post as ‘The Wizards flashiest fan’ is trying to raise 20 Million dollars as a starting point to bring KD to DC! Once we reach our goal we will either donate the 20 million to the Wizards to get the Durantula or we will donate it to Kevin Durant’s favorite charity since he loves our community so much!”

Paperboy Prince doesn’t wrestle with the reality that the Oklahoma City Thunder — whom Durant just led within a few quarters of the NBA Finals — likely represent his best shot at an elusive NBA championship outside of Golden State, but we should not expect a man who wears a yellow Game Boy to deal in reality.

At least Paperboy Prince is trying to negate the Thunder’s other advantage of being able to offer more money as his incumbent team, and he only needs $19,999,948 more to reach his fundraising goal. Just a few more paper routes and “KD 2 DC” iTunes downloads, and he’ll be there. Seems simple enough.

“I’m not discouraged because Rome wasn’t built in a day,” he told The Washington Post, without a hint of sarcasm in that voice of a generation of his. “All we need is one million people with $20 or two million people with $10. I hold the Paperboy Prince blessing. I literally know that with my words and my energy and the Wizards fans behind me, we can make anything happen. We’re not the Raptors. What kind of name for a team is that? We’re the Wizards. Literally magic is in our name. It’s about believing in the impossible. We’re going to make the impossible happen. That’s what being a Wizard is about.”

Then, all he has to do is convince Durant to leave a team that nearly won the West to join one that finished three games out of the Eastern Conference playoffs. But lofty goals don’t appear to stop Paperboy Prince from doing his thing, and those pepperoni pizza slices do look awfully enticing.

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Ben Rohrbach is a contributor for Ball Don’t Lie and Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @brohrbach