While many people are excited for the upcoming Verzuz battle between T.I. and Jeezy, the “And Then What” rapper recently revealed that he initially wanted to go up against his longtime foe, Gucci Mane.
During an interview with “The Breakfast Club,” Jeezy says he reached out to Swizz Beatz about battling the “Lemonade” emcee, but Gucci “respectfully declined.”
“Imma keep it a buck,” the Snowman said. “When I even got the call about Verzuz, I got the call from Swizz. Swizz called me. I was like, ‘Yo Swizz if I do it, it’s only one person I’ll do it with.’ And he was like, ‘Who?’ I was like, ‘Gucci. Reach out to him. Let me know what’s up.’”
Jeezy then said Gucci declined to go up against him in the popular Instagram Live series. “I reached out,” he added. “Swizz hit back and said he respectfully declined. Cool. Done. Kept it moving. I was gonna do it for the culture. We could’ve did it for the culture.”
He added, “I’m in, it’s whatever. One thing Imma stand on is what I stand for.”
After he got off the phone with Swizz, he said he saw T.I.’s Instagram post calling for him to accept his Verzuz challenge. “I hung up the phone,” Jeezy continued. “Three minutes later, that’s when I saw my brother’s video calling me out.”
Back in October, Gucci took to Twitter to say that he wouldn’t be participating in a Verzuz battle unless he was getting paid. “Stop asking me about doing a @verzuzonline battle,” he tweeted. “Unless they got a million dollars, they scared of Wop. #GuccimaneVsWhoever.”
T.I. vs. Jeezy is set to go down on Nov. 19 at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT. Check out Jeezy’s interview on “The Breakfast Club” below. The Verzuz talk begins around the 11:50 mark.