At the onset of the East Coast-West Coast beef that divided the nation of hip-hop in half with Tupac Shakur and Biggie Smalls, you could find Suge Knight’s infamous 1995 Source Awards rant.

And while there was never any doubt that Death Row’s former CEO was taking a direct shot at P. Diddy during the rant, the Bad Boy Records chief commander says that Knight told a different side to that story. 

During his conversation with hosts of the Drink Champs podcast, Diddy says Knight backed down from the publicized shade thrown at the awards show, claiming he was actually referencing the So So Def executive Jermaine Dupri.  

According to Diddy, the two found each other bumping elbows at the show’s after-party held at New York City’s The Tunnel nightclub. Just moments before seeing him there, however, Knight had used his Death Row Records platform to ignite hip-hop’s most widely known rap beef: The Notorious B.I.G. versus Tupac Shakur.

“Any artist out there that wants to be an artist, stay a star and won’t have to worry about the executive producer trying to be all in the videos, all on the records, dancing,” Suge said, throwing shade at Diddy and the Bad Boy crew, “Come to Death Row!”

Diddy also revealed he had a cordial relationship with Suge Knight in which he said Knight had even picked him up from the LAX airport and had shown him nothing but industry mate love. So he decided to confront Suge about the statement.

“So when I ran up and asked him, he said, ‘Nah, I was talking about Jermaine Dupri,'” Diddy said. “At that point, I was scared because I know the wolves that was with me. They was like real-life wolves. And I'm from Harlem. I don’t want no violence, no danger, none of that s**t. So I really put it in my head that it gave me reason for my ego to walk away.”

He later added that a choice to confront Suge right then and there on the Source Awards stage would have been great for beef, but bad for business.

“It was a decision that the city was waiting for me to make. They let me know they was with me,” he said in regard to keeping his cool. “And so me knowing I could do mass destruction wasn’t something that was authentic to me. That wasn’t who I was.”

Check out the rest of Diddy’s commentary and the infamous Source Awards speech from Suge Knight below.