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It’s been a years-long task to figure out just who The Notorious B.I.G. was talking about on “I Got A Story To Tell,” from his 1997 posthumous album Life After Death. The lyrics talk about a New York Knicks player who was the victim of a robbery, and since then, exactly which NBA player he was referring to has been a mystery.
Credit where it’s due, though: Bomani Jones and Dan Le Batard, hosts of the ESPN show Highly Questionable, have been on the case since 2014, when former Knick John Starks was a guest and said he knew the player, but wouldn’t fess up the identity except for confirming that it wasn’t him.
Today, Jones and Le Batard had their big breakthrough: Fat Joe was a guest on the program, and he revealed that the Knick in question was Anthony Mason, who was with the team from 1991 to 1996.
“What I heard was, it was about Anthony Mason,” he said. “That was the rumor, that was a very strong possibility rumor, that it was about Anthony Mason.”
Mason, who passed away in 2015, has a substantial history in hip-hop music aside from “I Got A Story To Tell.” He appeared in the music videos for “Best Kept Secret” by Diamond D and “Root Down” by Beastie Boys, and the latter group also mentioned him in the song “B-Boys Makin’ With The Freak Freak”: “I got my hair cut correct like Anthony Mason.”
Watch Fat Joe talk about the song below, starting at 2:10 into the video.
FINALLY: @Fatjoe reveals Biggie’s “I got a story to tell” was about Anthony Masonhttps://t.co/4JbN0OlnRX
— Highly Questionable (@HQonESPN) May 16, 2016