When Charron won this year’s “106 & Park” March Madness Freestyle Friday competition on BET, he was promised $5,000 and a spot on a BET Hip Hop Awards cypher. While Charron collected the $5,000, he says he was not given the chance to participate in a cypher.
Charron spoke with HipHopDX about his exclusion from the cypher and why he’s upset with how he feels the network handled the issue.
“I was avoided for months and given a response after the cypher was pre-filmed,” Charron says in an exclusive statement to HipHopDX. “At the end of the day, I was denied of a prize we contractually agreed on.
“I have proof that I’ve emailed people I’ve been dealing with,” Charron adds. “I made phone calls. I have records from June and earlier dates. They didn’t respond…They [later] told me they changed the format for this year, but if you look, there’s no format change. It’s the same as every year.”
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Prior Freestyle Friday winners have participated in the BET Hip Hop Awards cyphers, including Blind Fury and Bones Brigante.
Charron Says He’s Upset With BET Over Cypher Exclusion
Charron says he’s displeased with the fact that he is not in a BET cypher because that was the only reason he entered the March Madness Freestyle Friday competition.
“I’m very upset because I did this on my own dollar,” Charron says. “I’m coming from Canada. I had to quit my job to do this because I had a dream. I was confident that I’m the best. I feel like I’m the best freestyler in the world. I would have beat everyone there. I auditioned online for three years and they never let me on. They’re letting random bums on there with the swag image for their demographics. Finally, I got all my fans on Twitter to message them to give [me] a chance.”
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Charron says he spent thousands of dollars on this investment, hoping it would pay off in a BET cypher.
“[BET] told me from the start they weren’t gonna give me money for the hotel and bus,” Charron says. “I said, ‘That’s fine,’ because the exposure I was gonna get from the BET cypher was gonna be worth it. To me, I wouldn’t have done it if it was just $5,000 because I invested about $3,000 to do it. That’s only $2,000. I could make that doing a written battle instead of all this work. So, I was doing it for the BET exposure because there’s no way to gauge how good I was gonna do. I’ve been skyrocketing this year, working my hardest to improve my craft. With [a recent battle against] DNA, you can see the progression I’ve made. My buzz right now is at an all-time high. If you know anything about the game, you can go from the top to bottom anytime soon.
“This BET cypher could have skyrocketed my career,” Charron added. “To get the people they have on – they have Kendrick Lamar and all those guys – to get a verse from one of those guys has to be somewhere between $30,000 to $80,000. To actually be on the BET cypher with them, you can’t really gauge how much that is worth for your career. I get paid for shows. If I’m on the BET cypher, now I’m getting paid more for shows. Everything I do, I’m making more money off it. Now, I’m kicked off the cypher. You’ve got people on message boards saying, ‘Charron was kicked off the cypher because he’s not good enough.’ Now it’s public humiliation. It lowers my stock. I make money battling, too. This is ammunition for my future battlers. It’s public humiliation as well because I think I’m better than 90 percent of the people on that cypher so there’s no way I was kicked off because I wasn’t good enough. It’s just very upsetting.”
Charron’s first round against Interstate Fatz can be viewed below. In the clip, Bow Wow is heard saying that a slot on a BET Hip Hop Awards cypher will go to the winner of the match-up.
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HipHopDX has contacted BET and is awaiting an official response from the network.
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