“I’m Not a Player” was released in 1997 as the lead single to Big Pun’s debut album Capital Punishment. The B-side of the single was “Wishful Thinking” featuring Fat Joe, Kool G. Rap, and B-Real from Cypress Hill. “I’m Not a Player” utilizes a sample from “Darlin' Darlin' Baby (Sweet Tender Love)” by The O'Jays. The O'Jays make a cameo in the music video as the band performing at the club where Pun is.

The song was later remixed as “Still Not a Player” featuring Joe and released as the second single from Capital Punishment.

Producer Minnesota talked about how the track came together during an interview with XXL magazine in 2004:

When I was younger, I used to go to the family parties in the projects on Webster [Avenue in the Bronx]. When I was a little kid they used to play the O'Jays record ‘Darlin’ Darlin' Baby.‘ I had found a jazz version of the record so I combined it with the original O'Jays joint. I actually had SWV in mind, to get the beat to them. But Big Pun heard it and he loved it.

I played the track for him and he had a vision for it. I didn’t disagree with him; the only thing I had disagreed with him about is when we got to [the chorus of the radio version, where he said], ‘Crush a lot.’ I was like, ‘Crush a lot? Find another word.’ He was like, ‘There’s no other word, watch.’

Fat Joe also talked about the track:

I argued with Pun to the day that he died that I gave him that line: ‘I’m not a player, I just fuck a lot.’ We [were] watching the videos in the house, they had the shiny suits and was flashing the watches and all that. I was like, ‘We need to make a record like: 'I ain’t a player, I just fuck a lot.’ He was like, ‘Word! That’s hot!’ Sat down right there and started writing it. Being that was his biggest record ever, he fought with me about it forever.