I was always a Nas fan before that and after that, but I'm tryna figure out... Did y'all Hov stans realistically think that Jay Z was gonna outbar Nas?
Like, realistically, what was y'all hoping would happen?
At least in the Kendrick/Drake beef, I knew going into it that there was no way in hell Drake was gonna outbar frickin Kendrick Lamar
What was y'all smoking??
I'll speak as a teenage Hov stan at the time of that beef (hence the username I will never get rid of, but I dont give a f now)
First of all, Jay-Z was on top of the rap game no question, like Drake was today (with the street cred to match) and was rolling with Michael Jackson and Mike Jordan and shyt lol
Nas had just put out his worst album and was considered trash at that point for the most part
Jay and Nas were still considered the Kings, but in a way Nas was kinda swept under the rug because he was living off legacy, and Jay was going into nuclear mode and running Summers. And they had bubbling stuff going on, and then lil beefs here and there (and remember, rap careers weren't that long back in that era, so 4-5 year career was like 20 today)
So when JayZ had enough (he was too cool for school at the time, not saying names, acting like a legend) and finally took to a stage to diss multiple rappers (Mobb Deep, Nas, etc.) after for some reason 10000 rappers started coming at him at same time, we had never seen anything like it, and he really did brush them off and carry the F outta them, with bars and with jokes (showing Prodigy on the Summer Jam screen, a term we will still use 20+ years later)
So then he drops Takeover with Blueprint, a classic album - I mean that just pretty much was the nail in the coffin for Nas. A CLASSIC, and a DISS that everyone was playing? C'mon
That's also what made Ether so crazy. Cuz he came out of the mud with that shyt, really was buried and gone (he was NOT Kendrick, he was Kendrick after doing some Nelly shyt) and no one elses bars really landed on JayZ like that. I actually rmemebr where I was when I first heard it, which is like remembering 9/11
And just like Drake, ppl still thought Jay would come back/maybe win, but he made a bad move IMO. SuperUgly was rushed, and something he did called People Talking which was only on mixtapes was way better to me, but when you put SuperUgly vs Ether, Ether washes it and was more quality, so thats what Jay stans would say - Takeover had one verse to Nas, Nas had a whole song, and SuperUgly was kinda a mixtappy rushed song (damn just like Drake)
The only reason JayZ stayed in the paint was because he was still respected on a street level in a way. A dude from Marcy, none of that weird allegation type stuff or getting slapped or peed on etc, so it was never not cool to like JayZ if you did, and you know young people live vicarioulsy though rappers, so the level of disrespect didnt get to Drake levels, where you can tell there are people who think hes a vulture (I dont care that much Im old now)
Many parallels though
