Granted, part of it wasn't his fault as his double CD, the original I AM was bootlegged heavily (not to mention his mother's health) and he had to rework or scrap a lot of material - but the talk then was that he fell off HARD. Weak albums, shaky concepts, bad shows. I think more than the beef with Jay, people were just glad that Nas was back and living up to his promise on Stillmatic. And then following up with what he was always capable of with Lost Tapes. I'd argue he's had a better career in his mid-late 30s than he did post Illmatic.