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Eminem is one of the most lyrically talented rappers of all time. Whether it’s Nas or Jay-Z, he has received recognition from all of the best MCs in the business. There are many good artists. Still, only a few can truly be classed as lyricists. That said, aside from Eminem, one of the most prominent lyricists is Louisiana legend Lil Wayne and Em once considered taking out his competition.

Aside from the ‘Stan’ rhymer, Lil Wayne was one of the most revered young lyricists in hip-hop. Although Eminem was breaking records, he was still worried about Lil Wayne’s potency in the rap game.  That said, he once considered dissing the ‘A Milli’ emcee.

Eminem has had a long career, and has made a slew of fantastic projects like The Marshall Mathers LP and Recover. However, he may have thrown that all away if he had decided to diss Lil Wayne and even the Detroit emcee himself has admitted this.

The ‘My Name Is’ performer once revealed that he viewed Weezy as a “genius.” Still, he began to doubt himself at one point and eventually became confident that Lil Wayne was the stronger artist. This led him to nearly dissing the New Orleans native.

During a 2010 interview with SPIN magazine, Eminem recalled, “I would hear lines of his, the way he’d connect his words, and I thought, ‘Man, I can do that s***. He ain’t that dope.’” He continued,  “I was hearing this dude say some clever, witty s***, and I wasn’t doing it, so I feel f***ed up.”

Eminem actually recorded a diss track against Lil Wayne featuring Kanye West. However, he decided not to release it because he knew the backlash would be highly consequential and potentially career-ending for him. Looking back in hindsight at that period of jealousy, Em admitted, “If I had done something like that? Where they were at and where I was at? It would have been career suicide. They would have f*ckin’ murdered me!”

Between 2009 and 2010, while recording his album, Recovery, Mathers confessed that the high quality of music being made by Wayne, Kanye and Drake made him bitter and frustrated beyond belief. The ‘No Love’ creator didn’t just tell the story to SPIN, but also unveiled more during an appearance on the Big Boy’s Neighbourhood radio show.

Speaking with the host he admitted, “I was kind of watching what was going on in the game, and it was like anything that was hot at that moment or anybody who was really killing shit at that moment I felt like—I felt so bad about myself and the music that I was creating, that I felt like I started to turn into a hater.”

In an attempt to clarify his then-mindset, the musician continued, “It wasn’t just—you know, singling Kanye and Wayne out at that period, I mean, they were the ones who were the killing it the most to me. And it hurt. I’d pop the CD in and be like, ‘Fuck man, I’m not doing this no more.’ I felt like I came very close to, like…for me, it would have been career suicide because I felt like, ‘I should make a song just dissing everybody who’s doing in it the game right now!’”

Luckily Eminem never dissed the two publicly or online and within a few years was collaborating with Lil Wayne on tracks like ‘Drop The World’ and ‘No Love’.