Honestly internet debates on this one are pretty split. In my relatively limited battle rap watching experiences there are mostly two kinds of fans. The guys who isolate everything from crowd time and place and purely judge bars and the dudes who put equal emphasis on crowd/performance and material. I dont think either is wrong tbh. The first group makes sense because a lot of people in crowds are dickriders or throw down for their home city. You can also see this affect reviewers who go to battles. Its like going to see boxing/fights live compared to the tv. It changes your perspective on shit a lot. On the other hand I identify with the second group because I think battle rap is performance art. Its basically competitive public speech and the crowd matters. Occasionally youll find a fan thats into both pretty equally like Jayblac. But generally its pretty split.
I'm in the latter camp. You can't completely isolate stuff IMO, because what is a good double entendre or scheme is someone delivers it horribly or with a janky flow. At the end of the day when I play that line back in my head, the performance element removes any sort of lyrical merit it may have.
It's good to protect against the extremes though. I think hype men make more of a difference than dick riders or crowd bias. I think T-Rex vs Aye Verb is a good study in this. Rex was MAULING Verb, and yes part of his performance was K-Shine yelling in the back but he had bars too. Verb blames the crowd for being biased and causing him to take that L but they fucked with him until he started spitting wack shit, even after he dissed NY; not to mention Verb had been a fan favourite forever before that.
I was gonna make this post about battlers I like/ respect, but there's too many, so instead I'll make one about who is overrated / I don't respect. I haven't seen all their stuff, but I'm not sure I even want to
Disaster
Arsonal
Pat stay
Aye verb
Ty law
Loe Pesci
The Saurus
Conceited
So much scust at this list.
Diz I can see an argument for being overrated.
Nobody thinks Arsonal is good anymore. He knows how to market himself and has a massive fanbase from being on TV and fixing battles in his favour but he has been shit for a very long time (though I did like Arsonal vs Verb recently).
Pay Stay is dope. Go watch Pat Stay vs Hollohan or vs. Head ICE. He's not the most lyrical or anything but he's very solid in all respects. Pat Stay vs Head ICE is one of my favourite battles ever.
All of Aye Verb's good battles are when he's at home in STL. Otherwise, he shows up with some bullshit. (vs Math was good though; Verb is just really inconsistent)
Ty Law has some crazy punch lines, I can see people not liking his monotone delivery but he has BARS. He's B Magic Jr.
Loe Pesci sucks, only people that rate him high are the easy to impress KOTD crowd.
The Saurus is GOAT freestyle contender.
Conceited is responsible for like 80% of Smack and GrindTime dude's styles in the new era. He's an innovator. SLOW IT DOWN.
