Rick Ross's team is likely framing this as a bold artistic choice—the Boss reclaiming his music on his own terms. No Drake? No problem. Ricky Rozay proved he doesn't need anyone else's vocals to command the stage.
Insiders say Rick Ross has been simmering in this beef since 2024, and last night was a calculated flex. The Verzuz stage gave him a captive audience of hip-hop heavyweights who watched him essentially erase Drake from a collaborative track in real time.
The diss occurred May 8, 2026, during Rick Ross's Verzuz battle against French Montana at a Los Angeles venue. French won narrowly with a 10-9 decision. Rick previously dropped "Champagne Moments" in April 2024, coining the now-infamous "BBL Drizzy" diss.
Rick Ross didn't win Verzuz—but he walked away with something better: viral footage of him publicly discarding Drake's contribution to their own collab. That's a W in the court of public opinion.
The Verzuz stage was supposed to be about French Montana versus Rick Ross—two heavyweights going hit for hit on Thursday night in Los Angeles. But somewhere between "B.M.F." and "Hustlin'," Ricky Rozay turned the whole thing into a Drake roast, and let's just say Drizzy wasn't even in the building to defend himself. It happened when Rick Ross cued up "Aston Martin Music," his 2010 collaboration with Drake and Chrisette Michele.
The crowd probably expected a full performance of all three vocals—after all, that's how Verzuz usually works. But Rick had other plans. Before launching into the track, he told the audience point-blank: he wanted to do it without Drake's vocals.
When Drizzy's hook came around? He instructed everyone in the room to sing the "lil man part" themselves. That's right—the Boss made an entire arena replace one of hip-hop's biggest stars with a group chant.
Cold. This wasn't some spontaneous moment either. Rick Ross has been positioning himself against Drake for years, but he escalated things significantly during the Drake-Kendrick Lamar feud when he dropped "Champagne Moments" back in April 2024.
That track gave us the infamous diss "BBL Drizzy," a nickname that stuck to Drake like glue and became shorthand for his perceived softness in the rap beef. Rick wasn't just throwing shade Thursday night—he was collecting on years of bad blood, and he did it on one of hip-hop's most-watched stages. French Montana ultimately eked out a narrow victory at the end of the night, beating Rick Ross 10-9 in the official Verzuz decision.
French brought hits like "Unforgettable" and "No Stylist" to seal the win. But here's the thing—nobody's really talking about French's performance today. They're talking about Rick Ross standing on that stage, pointing at a speaker where Drake's vocals should have been, making an entire crowd participate in dissing one of the biggest names in music.
That's not a Verzuz battle outcome—that's a statement. The internet has already picked sides, with fans divided between calling Rick Ross petty and praising him for refusing to give Drizzy his flowers on stage. But whether you think this was legendary or lowkey cringe, one thing's clear: Rick Ross just turned a nostalgic collab into the most talked-about moment of Verzuz 2026. Drake may not have been in that Los Angeles venue Thursday night—but he certainly wasn't forgotten.
