“Dude, $1,000 money match, Kage versus Westballz? That’d be fuckin’ hype,” says the commentator, Charles “Fuzzyness” Kimmelman, alluding to trash talk between the two players.

Since Twitter and Reddit had not yet supplanted Smash World Forums as the Smash community’s primary social platform at the time, it’s likely that Westballz and Kage’s beef originated on that site, now known as Smashboards. It appears that this trash talk bled into the Twitch chat of the B.E.A.S.T. 3 friendlies stream. Unfortunately, Smashboards’ search function is limited, and I was unable to find the original source of the commentator’s excitement.

Kage and Westballz currently have an even record in tournament sets. At Apex 2014, Kage defeated Westballz 2-0 in round 2 pools; a year later, Westballz beat Kage 3-1 at The Big House 5. They haven’t played since, though Kage defeated Westballz’s Donkey Kong in a challenge match at the first Smash Summit.

It’s impossible to predict the winner of Kage and Westballz’s upcoming money match. Westballz is clearly the favorite; he is the higher-ranked player, and his main is known to have an advantageous matchup against Ganon. However, Kage has been known to win high-profile money matches over Falcos in the past, and he would certainly not be Westballz’s worst loss this year if he were to take the W.

Either way, this set has been a long time coming.

