From the time he co-founded Death Row Records with Dr. Dre in the early 90s, Marion “Suge” Knight has made his presence felt on the West Coast. From the stories of the former N.W.A bodyguard hanging Vanilla Ice over a hotel balcony to his legendary “renegotiating tactics,” Suge has been the subject of countless chapters in LA folklore. But unlike Rick James and Prince, these tales are often more film noir than comedic.
Former NFL player and current co-host of Max & Marcellus on ESPN radio Marcellus Wiley was nice enough to share with HipHopDX a time when he almost found himself on the wrong end of one of those stories.
“I was at a club and we had like two tables combined, so we sit down at one and [the hostess] is looking for the [people at] the other one, I’m like, ‘let’s just take this one next to us.’” recalled Wiley to DX during Power 106’s recent Powerhouse concert. “[The hostess] was like, ‘No I don’t think you can use that one.’ I was like ‘Why? I thought you said we had two tables.’
So we just take over cause there’s too many of us and nobody’s there. I love getting to clubs early. I don’t know why, cause I’ma spend thousands of dollars so I wanna get my money’s worth. So I’m there and all the sudden we hear the security like ‘Y’all gotta get up. Y’all gotta get up. That’s supposed to be Suge’s table.’ I’m like, ‘Okay, well if it’s Suge’s table I’m about to get up but I don’t want to. Next thing you know [The] Game went up and he started freestyling and rapping at the club so I’m like, ‘Forget that, Game’s rapping, I ain’t moving,’ and I kinda got absentminded. Suge’s supposed to have his table.”
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After a while Suge’s party showed up and Wiley, whose crew had scattered throughout the club had to make a choice.
“So all of a sudden everybody just starts scattering and stuff,” Wiley said with a laugh. “Next thing you know I’m like damn near at the table by myself. I’m like ‘What the hell done happened? Everybody dipped,’ and they were like ‘Yo, Suge’s table came.’ So, I get up. I move somewhere else, I punked out, I had to! (Laughs) I mean this is Death Row days!* So we get outside and I’m in a Rolls Royce, a white Phantom and I’m sitting there and it’s almost like the Jaws music starts going off, ‘Duhn-Duhn Duhn-Duhn.’ I’m lookin’ around and then Game and Willie McGinest came up to me and were like, ‘Dawg, you better get outta here.’ I’m like, ‘What’s up?’ And supposedly [Suge and his people] took me not getting up [from their table] immediately as like beef and Suge and his people were looking for me. I was like ‘whoa.’ So I bail out. I get outta there.”
After a few days and the looming certainty of crossing paths with the rap mogul, Wiley and Suge crossed paths.
“Maybe a week or two later I see Suge and then we chopped it up, I was like ‘Dawg, I heard you was sending your boys after me.’ He was like ‘That was you Wiley? My bad (Laughs),’ I was like ‘Man you almost got me killed up in there talkin’ bout ‘My bad!’ So the moral of the story is if you get to the club early be prepared to move!”
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*Editor’s Note: Not the good ‘ol Death Row days per se, but obviously Suge still had a presence in the rap game.
