In an interview with the Art of Dialogue, Juelz Santana responded to accusations he's "lazy" and Cam'ron and Mase's suggestion that he wasn't able to live up to his huge potential.
"Cam, he didn't use those words... They did mention me being the next Jay-Z, and I mean, yeah maybe I could have," Santana said near the start of the chat, as seen above. "I wouldn't want to say Jay-Z, because I never strived to be Jay-Z. I think that's where Jim [Jones] kind of took it. ... I never was trying to be Jay-Z, I was always just trying to be me, you know?"
He said that early in his career, some suggested that he could be the "King of New York," but he was more comfortable with "Prince of the City."
"I never wanted that king spot... I was that n***a, so in that sense I know what they saying," he continued. "I definitely could have been way further than I am, know what I'm saying? But I don't never blame nobody, that's what the thing is with me. I don't never... I blame myself for anything that's held me back."
He also fought back against the suggestion he was lazy. "You could never say I was lazy," he said. "Even if you look at my track record in the game, right, I didn’t put out albums. And for whatever reason I didn’t put out albums, politic reasons, I still gave hella music. Look at my mixtape track record, I got about nine mixtapes out there, don't get it twisted. I mean, me and [Lil] Wayne got two mixtapes out there."
Santana, who has released two studio albums, said that the label was to blame for the lack of commercially-released music from him. He decided that he would often "not turn in the album," suggesting there were issues between him and Def Jam. "They not doing what I need them to do," he added. "I never felt like I had the team around me that I needed to have to push me to that next level."
During a guest appearance on Gillie Da Kid and Wallo's Million Dollaz Worth of Game podcast, Cam'ron and Mase praised Santana's talents but suggested he wasn't able to reach his full potential.
"Real talk, he had it," Cam said after he said Santana "could've been Hov level" at one point. "And he had it at a young age. He could've been the leader of everything that's going outside right now. He could've been all these young n***as' father, uncle, whatever you wanna call it. The chicks liked him, he could rap, he was fly. He had every element you needed to be that n***a."
As for why he thought Santana didn't reach that potential, he said he wasn't sure. "I wouldn't say [had] poor work ethic, but I'm just not sure why," he said. "Juelz is sitting there with 300 songs in his hard drive, and won't put it out."
