Website Explores Similarities Between Rick Ross and Notorious B.I.G.

Rick Ross Week is upon us. With the release of the rapper's new 'Teflon Don' slated for today (July 20), expect a gigantic promotional push with critics and pundits offering their opinions on Ross' career and newest effort. Yesterday, the Huffington Post published an editorial entitled 'Rick Ross: Living out Notorious B.I.G.'s Dream?' -- yet another salvo that explores the similar physical features and business strategies of both rappers.

"The similarities between Ross and Notorious B.I.G. are undeniable," writes Daniel Weisman. "Their physical frames are nearly identical, their rapping styles and vocabularies overlapping and they even shared a manager (Diddy). Notorious, though he only got two albums into his career, was both literally and figuratively larger than life."

We will give him the point on the rappers' sizes, but this claim that their "rapping styles and vocabularies" are overlapping needs to be thoroughly debunked. Biggie was known for his complex delivery -- a rapidfire, machine gun of language that often featured multisyllabic internal rhymes. Ross is known for a slow cadence. He uses physical force and strong enunciation to sound intimidating and push novel punch lines over traditionally epic synth-heavy production. While both could be considered cinematic and reference cocaine, that's not enough of a similarity for this too-common comparison.

Even Diddy recently moved to end this sort of talk during his recent interview with Peter Rosenberg. "I want to make it clear that I never compared [Rick] Ross to Biggie -- there'll never be another Biggie," he said. "I feel like [Rick Ross] really just begun. He has a great sense of musicality and he's from a different space. He's an exciting artist ... and he has a long way to go before he reaches greatness, but he's on his way."