The fifth annual Champion Of The Year took place a week ago and two of CHH’s finest walked away with some prized accolades and bragging rights.
For those who don’t know, Champion of The Year is an award that’s given to the battle rapper who performed the best in that particular year. Champion Of The Year or COTY, is the brainchild of battle rap media personality Jayblac. The award was meant to incentivize battle rappers to do their best all year long and to uplift the battle rap culture and community as a whole.
2021 was a great year for battle rap and the seven and a half hours spent debating the top twenty battle rappers in the world, are proof of that. Loso, who battled twelve times that year, ended up at the number 9 spot. He originally landed at the number 8 spot but a shift happened that caused all the battle rappers to move down one spot. That’s not all that Loso left with: the fans voted his second round against Viixen The Assassin as the “Round of The Year!” His battle against Viixen took place back in March, but the battle rap culture as a whole have been talking about that round the rest of the year. Congrats to Loso on his placement and his award!
Each panelist on the COTY panel has their own top twenty battle rap list and the whole panel debates to settle the overall top twenty. In Jayblac’s own words, “16 is the new 20.” What he means by that is that after the names are placed on the top 20 list, there are several shifts that happen. It’s been his experience that at least 4-5 shifts happen during the course of their discourse. This means that if you are number 16, you have just as much chance of being booted off the list as number 20. You aren’t really safe unless you are number fifteen and higher.
All that to say this: as the panelists approached the top 5, the debates got intense. At one point there was an argument trying to rank A. Ward above Tsu Surf, the fact that Ward and Rum Nitty could have been interchangeable at numbers 4 and 5, and so many other arguments. When the smoke cleared, A. Ward made it that coveted top five spot as number 5. While many may take issue with this, Ward is still listed as the number 5 battle rapper in the world with 23 battles under his belt. The world Craig. That’s nothing to sneeze at.
2021 has shown the world what most of the CHH fans already knew: Loso and A. Ward are two of the best battle rappers in the world, and they just so happen to be Christians. Shout out to The IV Horsemen.
Although Vibe magazine failed to do so, this writer wants to acknowledge all the hard work that Jayblac has put in for COTY for half a decade. This man did it all: from raising the money, camera work, securing the venue, paying for the belt and the ring, to so many other behind the scenes efforts. It takes a lot to pull off an event of this magnitude consistently and in excellence. Shout out to Jayblac AKA Blac-Man, AKA “Mr. Shake My Hand.”
