Through years of shapeshifting musical structures, increasingly free associative writing and, punching in, and frankly, murder, the notion of truly high-stakes rap battles had been a dormant one. And, following the Drizzy V. Kung Fu Kenny melee, it’s probably headed back to hibernation. It’s a fate dictated as much by cultural shifts as their stature as philosophically opposed giants. Drake has more Hot 100 hits than any artist… ever. And he’s written hit singles for everyone from Jamie Foxx to Alicia Keys. Kendrick won a Pulitzer Prize for DAMN., and “Not Like Us” literally won Song of the Year and Record of the Year. Both are rap formalists with multiple No. 1 singles and the mic skills to eviscerate any beat — and mostly — any opponent set before them. The folks that can rap near that level never match their commercial success; the ones that have the commercial success rarely rap near that level. It’s an existential seesaw that could eventually render past classic rap battles … well … things of the past.

“This battle does mark, in my opinion, a bit of an inflection point, because I think we have a lot of fans now who are not rap fans,” says Sowmya Krishnamurthy, author of Fashion Killa: How Hip-Hop Revolutionized High Fashion. “They’re fans of this sort of nebulous culture, where it’s about vibes and what’s on the charts and what’s trending. That’s what they’re running toward. It’s not good or bad, but that’s very different from people who know rap.”

For veteran industry exec and media personality Wayne “Wayno” Clark, the potential dearth of A-Lister rap battles comes down to maturity. Or rather, a lack thereof. “There’s a lot of men that just don’t know how to control their emotions … they would rather get into it in real life,” says Wayno, the creator and host of I’ll Do It Myself. “Nobody wants to take an L. Nobody wants to be able to say that somebody got one up on them. So it’s like the whole culture of today is, when it comes to some sort of conflict, it’s about can I get you up out of here…” The answer to that question can be a lot of things. A snarky tweet. A funny Instagram post. Or, much more tragically, a brazen killing.

Four years ago, both Young Dolph and Drakeo The Ruler were murdered in their respective hometowns, with many alleging the slayings to be connected to long-simmering rap beef. Both delivered scathing diss tracks that went largely unresponded to, and instead of philosophical rap debates, people debated about murder suspects. Instead of recalling all the exhilarating highs of a well-executed punchline, people felt the recoil of tragedy. While they weren’t A-listers in a conventional sense, the manner — and the context — of their deaths stands as a reminder that the distance between street rap and the literal streets has never been smaller.

As a young A&R at Roc-A-Fella Records amid D-Block’s beef with State Property more than 20 years ago, Wayno remembers close calls; cars filled with guns, ammunition, and folks more than willing to use all of it. “We were moving like the military,” he recalls. “And they were, too.” Still, things thankfully stayed on wax. With the advent of drill music, Wayno says, rap beef took a more consistently murderous turn.

“If you 10 years old, you came up off Chief Keef and them, their beefing was a different level of beefing. It was about music, but it was about real violence that was happening in the street at that very moment,” Wayno says. “When I came up in music, it was really dangerous where they would say what they wanted to do to you, and if they got up with you and it was like that then it could go there. But it wasn’t in the studio. It wasn’t like, ’Oh no, we going to hurt these dudes in real life.’”

For his part, Styles P remembers tasting all flavors of beef 20 years ago. A not-so-playful back-and-forth with Roc-A-Fella. A playful tiff with 50 Cent. And then the literal street beef makes that rap beef seem as meaningful as a random pickup game. “When you’re in the midst of really going through some shit in real life and it’s really happening, you’re not really looking at rap beef as other beef,” says The Ghost. “Even though it could go down, it’s a lot lighter than actually having a beef with people in a closer proximity to you.”

Still, that doesn’t mean Styles didn’t have fun, and just like everyone else, he enjoyed last year’s Drizzy versus K. Dot matchup. “Rap was a little too friendly for me,” he shares. “But it just felt like it lacked competitiveness. Have you ever gone to a basketball court to not be the MVP? I’m here with a team, but do I want everybody else to score more than me? What kind of mind state is that to have?”

“I like to joke that it felt like everyone was being friends with each other, which on one hand is great, that everyone is friends with each other, but it’s terrible for rap competition,” adds Krishnamurthy. Wayno appreciated the competitive fireworks, too. But the conversations surrounding them — an overflow of non-sequitur arguments, judgy condemnations, and crystalline Standom — were more than a little irritating by the end of the bout.

“When Ebro [Darden] said the whole thing about Drake being a sickness, I was just like, ‘Yo bro, come on,’” Wayno continues. “I felt like [Drake] handled the post-battle terribly. But to say this man is ‘a sickness’ and we’ve been listening to this man’s music … I’m not looking at it that deep. Because if we start looking into shit that deep, we gotta cut out mad people’s music — not just R. Kelly.”

The “post-battle” stuff Wayno mentions is Drake’s lawsuit against UMG, which alleges that they used bots in order to boost numbers for “Not Like Us,” which, at press time, has over 1.4 billion Spotify streams. “At the point where you challenge me to a fight — not knowing that I know jujitsu — and you swing on me and I pull your ass on the floor and stretch you into four different ways like a pretzel and now you’re crying because you’re down and you’ve never felt this pain… don’t start saying, now I want to call the authorities,” Wayno says. “It’s not even fun,” he adds. ”Everything after the battle made it not fun.”

“I think the suing thing is something that’s definitely never happened before,” adds Styles. “So that’s very shocking to see. It’s almost like he couldn’t handle losing. I didn’t think he lost badly, he just didn’t win. But I think with social media, it magnified [the loss],” Styles continues. “Somebody should have told him, whenever you’re on top like that, people could love you, but they’ll be happy to see you fall as well.” People might have seen Drake fall, but the sheer enormity of the spectacle remains its own kind of landmark accomplishment.

According to Billboard, Kendrick Lamar’s Super Bowl LIX Halftime Show, wherein he performed “Not Like Us,” reached 133.5 million viewers, a total that eclipsed Michael Jackson’s Super Bowl Halftime show 32 years prior. While his diss tracks didn’t reach the commercial peaks of “Not Like Us,” “Family Matters” still hit No. 7 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, and, despite large-scale belief that Kenny collected the W, plenty of folks rode hard for Drizzy’s best shots. Yeah. Insert whichever “hip-hop won” kind of phrase you want. But it’s true.

“We really saw two artists at the top of their game; two gladiators going head-to-head,” Krishnamurthy says. “And I think just as far as focusing on the records, talking about hip-hop again, it really did inject a lot of excitement and interest just within the idea of rapping. And it had been a long time.” But how long will it be until the next time? Can there be one?

“I would think so, because I look at rap as a competitive verbal sport,” Styles says. “I don’t think it’ll be soon, but I do think that it’ll happen again. I don’t know if I’ll be around to witness when the next one happens, but hopefully so.”

If not, we’ll just have to recline in our barber chair, endure some heinous takes and remember the good ol’ days.