To be fair, he came out in the late 90s, his album came out in 2004 and went double platinum worldwide, his second album went gold and eventually platinum 2 years later.
At that point he was 10 years in the game with 2 platinum albums and 2 platinum g-unit albums and 2x platinum g-unit ost compilation.
that's 5 projects that went platinum with him being a major part of each of their success commercially.
how many artists even stay hot past their second year in the game -- not many.
i think he played his cards right and whether he was sober or not it would've went the same way because he has the same opportunities now as he did then.
i think it's his work ethic and not actually knowing the record business properly.