]Everyone always argues about who the best is but there's never been a real comprehensive way to come up with who the real top 20 are as far as different people's opinions go.

To solve that, I've come up with categories in which we can use to come up with a precise way to rank each rapper.

The Categories I came up with are: Public Outlook, which consist of 2 main categories; 1.IMPACT, (how much your music has affected rap, how much you have influenced others--fans mainly, by your music) 2.CRITICAL ACCLAIM and 3.ALBUM SALES

Now, that category will account for 40 % of the total votes.

The public opinion category, as you've seen, will be broken into 3 sub-categories. Each of these categories will hold a differing amount of percentage points of the 40 % total for Public Outlook by their level of importance.

Critical Acclaim, which I feel is the category that is the most telling, as far as public outlook of your music goes, will account for 50 % (20 points) of the 40 points. Impact will account for 40 % (16 points) of the 40 public outlook points, and album sales will account for 10 % (4 points) of the 40 public Outlook points .


To better come up with a precise score, we have to define what we feel is the normal or half of each category; that way, we can score above, in the middle, or below, in a more accurate way.

As far as critical acclaim goes, I look at the normal being, comming out and getting a equal amount of fair reviews and an equal amount of negative reviews from the press. So, you have to look at the different outlets that judge a rapper--magazines, award shoes, fans, in general, and come up with a percentage point of a possible 100 percent that you feel the rappers acclaim is at.

Impact is also the same, but album sales is more tricky. In my opinion--I may be wrong, an average of 350,000 albums sold is the average for rappers. And around 5 million 5,000,000 or more, is the 4 point or the highest amount given. Use your basic math skills to come up with the rating, also when you judge album sales, think about it relativily. An underground rapper with little promotion but with sales of 200,000 would be at the 4 point platue, while a rapper with a lot of promotion and is on a good label, Freeway, but with sales of like 500,000 would be at the 3 or less platue.




Now the other category I came up with in order to judge a rapper is skills. I broke skills into 6 categories

1.Song Writing ability-[10 points] (coherence of verses, ability to stick to the subject at hand, depth of lyrics, etc etc, storytelling skills included)

2.Flow-[10 points]

3.Points made, ability to sell point of view, persona, and lyrics; ability to persuade. [10 points]

4.Cleverness, creativity, originality -[10 points]

5.Battling- [10 points]

6.Charisma- [10 points]

60 points

So it's 40 points by Public Opinion + 60 points of rapping skills, which totals 100 points all together.

Everyones ratings will be edited onto this post. I'll take the average rating for a rapper with multiple ratings and edit it in.

So Far (percentage out of 100 total points)

1.Eminem (98.3%)
2.Jay-Z (94.6%)
3.Notorious B.I.G (94%)
4.Big L (93.4%)
5.Tupac (92%)
6.Nas (91.6%)
7.Slick Rick (88.6%)
8.Cormega (87.6%)
9.Too Short (83%)
10.Big Boi (49.5%)
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.

Here's an example, and these are a few of my ratings.

Big L

Skills:

songwriting-10/10
flow-10/10
Ability to sell character & points, believability- 10/10
Cleverness, Creativity-10/10
Battling- 10/10
Charisma- 10/10

SKILLS- 10/10

People's opinions, public outlook :

Critical acclaim- 18/20
Impact- 13.44/16
Album sales-2/4

PUBLIC OUTLOOK- 33.44/40

BIG L TOTAL SCORE- 93.44/100
---------------------------------------------------

Nas

Public Outlook:

Critical Acclaim- 18.6/20
Impact-14.56/16
Album sales- 2.7/4

TOTAL PUBLIC OUTLOOK, OPINION- 35.86/40

Skills:

Song Writing-10/10
Flow- 8.9/10
ability to sell character & points, believability- 9.5/10
Cleverness, Creativity, Originality- 9.65/10
Battling- 10/10
Charisma- 7.7/10

SKILLS- 55.75/60

NAS TOTAL SCORE------ 91.61/100

It still all boils down to an individuals mere opinion.Like you giving Big L 10/10 on everything.......Thats just your opinion. :)

I know, but it's not only mine that will shape the top 20, it will be an average of EVERYONES opinion.

I know, but it's not only mine that will shape the top 20, it will be an average of EVERYONES opinion.
Oh OK well I will check it out when there is more to see.It seems quite complex.

Tupac

Public Outlook:

Critical Acclaim- 19.5/20
Impact-16/16
Album sales- 4/4

TOTAL PUBLIC OUTLOOK, OPINION- 39.5/40

Skills:

Song Writing-9/10
Flow- 10/10
Points made, believability- 9/10
Cleverness, Creativity, Originality- 8.5/10
Battling- 6.4/10
Charisma- 10/10

SKILLS- 52.9/60

Tupac TOTAL SCORE------ 92.4/100

Dope, dope.

When you see the 16.56 decimals like that and you wonder how in the hell I got those figures, well here's how I got 'em.

All I did was think about the percentage of the total points that I feel the person is in the category. Then I multiplied that percentage by the total number to get the numbers that I did.

EX. .90(10)= 9/10..

I'm a be doing a lot of rating later on tonight.

Can I do more ratings?

Yeah, do as many as you want, afterall it will all get averaged out if there are multiple votes on a rapper. Anyone can do as many ratings on as many rappers as they want, just limit it to 1 rating per rapper--You can go back and edit your rating if you change your opinion on the rapper. Pm me, and I'll make corrections.

The Notorious B.I.G.

Public Outlook:

Critical Acclaim- 19.5/20
Impact-15/16
Album sales- 4/4

TOTAL PUBLIC OUTLOOK, OPINION- 38.5/40

Skills:

Song Writing-10/10
Flow- 10/10
Points made, believability- 8.5/10
Cleverness, Creativity, Originality- 9/10
Battling-9.5/10
Charisma- 8.5/10

SKILLS- 55.5/60

Biggie's TOTAL SCORE------ 94/100

The Notorious B.I.G.

Public Outlook:

Critical Acclaim- 19.5/20
Impact-15/16
Album sales- 4/4

TOTAL PUBLIC OUTLOOK, OPINION- 38.5/40

Skills:

Song Writing-10/10
Flow- 10/10
Points made, believability- 8.5/10
Cleverness, Creativity, Originality- 9/10
Battling-9.5/10
Charisma- 8.5/10

SKILLS- 55.5/60

Biggie's TOTAL SCORE------ 94/100
That's way too high for Biggie...

Sorry man, thats the only bad thing about this idea. Its just my opinion.

Sorry man, thats the only bad thing about this idea. Its just my opinion.

It's not really a matter of opinion to see Biggie have no charisma at all. Guy was always so damn quiet.

If you think it's way too high for him, post your own rating of him and it will even out somewhat.

If you think it's way too high for him, post your own rating of him and it will even out somewhat.
I don't think the whole rating was high for him, just the charisma part. I agree with the rest of it.

I've got a notebook of a few ratings, when I get home I'm a have to copy and paste them on here tommorow.

Biggie is def not tthat high for me.

Maybe your right, B.I.G. didn't have the best carisma. I just leave it, if you don't like it, post your own.

This seems mad complex, But I will give it a try in a few.

Too Short

Public Outlook:

Critical Acclaim- 18/20
Impact-16/16
Album sales- 4/4

TOTAL PUBLIC OUTLOOK, OPINION- 38/40

Skills:

Song Writing-6/10
Flow- 9/10
Points made, believability- 7/10
Cleverness, Creativity, Originality- 8/10
Battling-5/10
Charisma- 10/10

SKILLS- 45/60

Too Short's TOTAL SCORE------ 83/100

Switched it up with a West Coast OG. Albums sales 9 out of his 16 went Platinum or Gold. He also sold a couple million out of the back of his trunk when he was first on the scene into all his mixtapes and west coast collabos.

have you all checked out Kool Moe Dee's book called "There's a good on the Mic"? it rates 50 MC's all time. its a good read.

It's all good for comming up with a better determinant of who the greatest is. I gotta add something else, when you judge album sales, think about it relativily. An underground rapper with little promotion but with sales of 200,000 would be at the 4 point platue, while a rapper with a lot of promotion and is on a good label, Freeway, but with sales of like 500,000 would be at the 3 or less platue.

Some ones a did yesterday

Big Boi

Public Outlook:

Critical Acclaim- 4/16 (not too many people think he's dope)
Impact- 16/16 (just for co-founding Outkast)
Album sales- 4/4

TOTAL PUBLIC OUTLOOK, OPINION

Skills:

Song Writing-2/10
Flow- 10/10
Ability to sell points, believability - 1.5/10
Cleverness, wit, Creativity, - 4/10
Battling- 6/10
Charisma- 2/10

Big Boi's TOTAL SCORE------ 49.5/100

Cormega

Public Outlook

Album Sales- 4/4 (Guy sold 200,000 on both albums with little to no marketing)

Critical Acclaim- 19.2/20
Impact- 8/16

Public Outlook total: 31.2/40

Skills:

Song Writing- 10/10
Creativity, cleverness, concepts, wit- 9.8/10
Charisma- 9/10
Ability to sell points, believability- 10/10
Battling- 9.4/10 (he's murdered Nas on several occasions)
Flow-8.2/10

Skills total: 56.4/60

Overall total: 87.6/100

Jay-Z

Public Opinion:

Album sales- 4/4
Impact- 16/16
Critical Acclaim- 19/20

public opinion total: 39/40

Skills:

Flow- 9.1/10
Battling- 10/10
Charisma- 7/10
Ability to sell points, believability- 10/10
Song Writing- 10/10
Creativity, concepts, wit- 9.5/10

skills total: 55.6/60

Overall total: 94.6/100

Slick Rick

Public Opinion:

Album Sales- 3.2/4
Critical Acclaim- 15.4/20
Impact- 16/16

Public Opinion total points: 34.6/40

Skills:

Flow: 10/10
Battling- 7/10
Charisma- 7/10
Song Writing- 10/10
Creativity, concepts, wit- 10/10
ability to sell points & character, believability- 10/10

Skills total: 54/60

Overall total: 88.6/100

Eminem

Skills:

Charisma- 10/10
Battling- 10/10
Ability to sell points & character, believability- 10/10
Songwriting- 10/10
Creativity, concepts, wit- 10/10
Flow- 8.7/10

skills total points: 59.4/60

Public Opinion:

Album Sales- 4/4
Impact- 16/16
Critical Acclaim- 19.6/20

public opinion total points 39.6/40

Overall total: 98.3/100 (And I don't even like Eminem, I'm just being honest. That's why I put in Public Opinion cause it would help balance out any bias you may have against a certain rapper)

Eminem

Skills:

Charisma- 10/10
Battling- 10/10
Ability to sell points & character, believability- 10/10
Songwriting- 10/10
Creativity, concepts, wit- 10/10
Flow- 8.7/10

skills total points: 59.4/60

Public Opinion:

Album Sales- 4/4
Impact- 16/16
Critical Acclaim- 19.6/20

public opinion total points 39.6/40

Overall total: 98.3/100 (And I don't even like Eminem, I'm just being honest. That's why I put in Public Opinion cause it would help balance out any bias you may have against a certain rapper)

Your ratings on Eminem are accurate. I have a question can we draw up rating for anyone? Or only legends?

Ratings can be done for anyone. The people with the top 20 ratings will go on the first post on the first page.

I like this because it makes you think objectively. Like, I never truely knew how I felt about certain rappers till I honestly did this.

****. What the hell are you Steelfist, a mad scientist? How in the hell did you come up with this complex stuff? Eminem is rated pretty high, though

I'll give some ratings soon.

Big Boi should get 10 out of 10 for creativity and cleverness. They are one of the most original and creative duos ever.

Good idea, to rank the general opinion of BoxingScene, especially since the opinion in music is soo varied here...

What I would have done however, is taken a much more simple average.

Eminem ranked #1 by someone = he gets 10 points.
-> then find the average of the points given to each rapper by every poster on this site. The one with the highest average points becomes BoxingScene G.O.A.T, and the ones with the least go to the bottom.

However, using your way, people think more about the individual aspects of each rapper...

Ill be interested in the results when you finally get them. :cool:

This is ****ing stupid. What ever happened to just listening to the music you like. Now everyone gotta have some kinda in depth opinion on who the GOAT is, like anyone gives a ****...acting like they formulating some conclusive statistics when all it is and ever will be is opinions.

This is ****ing stupid. What ever happened to just listening to the music you like. Now everyone gotta have some kinda in depth opinion on who the GOAT is, like anyone gives a ****...acting like they formulating some conclusive statistics when all it is and ever will be is opinions.
I guess this is just to get a feel of who the BoxingScene members like/dislike in the rap game. No more no less. :cool:

Well, I did it this way because it forces people to make a more informed decision about someone. When you tell someone to rate a rapper on a scale of 1-10, they're most likely going to come to a quick decision without actually taking the time to sit down and decipher the rapper's talents. Also, it's true that I gave individual categories as far as skills, but those individual categories all combine to form what actually makes a rapper good, it forces you to consider all parts of the rapper, and can balance out any prejudice that you have against them in a certain area. It's analytical, but I thought it would be fun and cool to have this but not too many people seem to want to participate. I see a lot of debates on here about rappers but when I put up a way for all our opinions to count and really show who is considered the greatest, guys sleep on it.


About Big Boi, I've listened to all Outkast cd's expect the last one. Almost every single verse that I've heard from him is about pimping, weed, gangsterism, or some other nonsense. If you listen clostly, it's mostly Andre that brings the originality to the group as far as lyrics go. The only reason I even gave Big Boi more than a 0 in creativity is because his ability to freestlye. He's been known to freestlye some of the songs on Outkast albums. Also, yeah he's co-founder of Outkast so he's partially responsible for the concept of the group, but his lack of originality and creativity in his verses makes me believe that it's Andre that really pushes the boundaries of creativity in Outkast.

This is ****ing stupid. What ever happened to just listening to the music you like. Now everyone gotta have some kinda in depth opinion on who the GOAT is, like anyone gives a ****...acting like they formulating some conclusive statistics when all it is and ever will be is opinions.


How is it stupid? A lot of people have opinions on who they feel is the best. Why not have some kind of format where everyones opinions can be combined to find the general consensus? No one is saying it's conclusive, either. All it is is trying to make the opinions more accurate and defined. It aint that serious.

Yeah, no one gives a **** :rolleyes: that's why on nearly every rap site there are millions of threads about who people think are the top 10 rappers ever. No one has the guts to come up with anything detailed or think hard about it, though. It's always just lazy, bull**** opinions.

Also, no one is saying that this will prove factually who the greatest is, all this is is a way to come up with a general consensus based on detailed thinking about what you really feel about a rapper.

You cant add up different MC's attributes and decide that MC A is superior to MC B because he has more points. Battling, public sales, critical acclaim and impact really dont mean **** and charisma is debatable. Out of the 9 categories you have I'd say only three are worth judging (and I'd put creativity, concepts and wit in with songwriting) and one MC may beat another in two of the three category but i may still prefer the other one so judging the categories really means nothing. But I'm sure a lot of people find it interesting and want to have yet another debate about who the goat is so carry on...

You cant add up different MC's attributes and decide that MC A is superior to MC B because he has more points. Battling, public sales, critical acclaim and impact really dont mean **** and charisma is debatable. Out of the 9 categories you have I'd say only three are worth judging (and I'd put creativity, concepts and wit in with songwriting) and one MC may beat another in two of the three category but i may still prefer the other one so judging the categories really means nothing. But I'm sure a lot of people find it interesting and want to have yet another debate about who the goat is so carry on...


Would you like to explain to me why you can't add up a different Mc's attributes and not be able to decide which mc is better based on their ranking? And it isn't about what mc you prefer, this aint a who's your favorite mc thread, it's more so a subjective rating of a rapper. Slick Rick is my favorite rapper but I have Eminem and others ahead of him, why? because I rated him based on everything that really makes a rapper good. If I was to say, who do you think is the best without making people actually be subjective about it, you'd get weak opinions, and un thought opinions like so many people give.

How can you say that impact and critical acclaim don't mean ****? Impact is a good way to judge a rapper because works have different level of impacts on people. Great works, Rakim lyrics for example, make a lot of impact, influence a lot of people while weaker works are bound not to impact people as strongly as work better than it. Critical Acclaim is basically props. It's one of the most important ways to judge a rapper because it tells you how informed people really feel about your work. As much as you'd like to disagree, it's a common fact that battling is a part of mcing. It's a part of an mc. When I say battling, I don't only mean battling as far as getting on stage like Jin, or dropping songs like takeover, I'm also talking about a rapper ability to debate, argue and affirm their beliefs. That's a trait that any great writer has.

Juice and Supernatural were two of the best battle rappers yet try to name one dope album by them...and Nas cant battle at all as he cant freestyle, does that mean anything? 50 cent has sold more and made more impact than a lot of MC's but that really means nothing. Unfortunately its more to do with marketing and exposure these days.

Individually and together a lot of these categories have no bearing on how good an MC is and it is pointless to judge all these categories. Your favourite MC is slick rick but you have put other MCs ahead of him...why? because someone else sold more or got better reviews or had more impact. That to me says that your list is shaped by other peoples opinions and not your own...and at the end of the day all this is is an opinion. See I'll just have my favourite MCs and **** going in depth with all these categories that mean nothing...but you carry on, I'll be interested to read the results.

You obviously don't get it yet. It's true that Juice and Supernatural are dope battlers and freestlers, that's a part of mcing so they deserve to have that aspect of their talents as a rapper count for how people rate them. However, what you fail to realize is that the rappers are rated on more than one category. So while you can say that Juice and Supernatural are great battlers, you'd also take into considerationg their ability to write songs, their flow, ability to persuade.. and other factors when you rate them OVERALL as rappers. The same goes with Nas, he can freestle, maybe not the best, but you'd look at other aspects of what makes a rapper when you're rating him. You can say, in one corner he isn't the greatest, but you'd weight other factors in when rating his OVERALL skill level. While some people may feel that certain aspects of mcing are more important than others, this thread was created to judge a rappers OVERALL talents. When you look at 50 cent, the impact that he's made has to count for something. It takes a special talent as a performer to be able to impact a broad range of your art. So, when judging 50 OVERALL, you'd have to take that part of his overall talent into consideration.


I don't understand why you can't comprehend this? It's just the same with anything. It's called analysing.

You've yet to intelligently explain how these categories have no bearing on how good an mc is. Everytime you hear a columnist or a group of distinguised critics argue about the talents of a rapper, they take into consideration a lot, if not all, of the categories that I listed. So who are you to say that these categories have no bearing on what makes a rapper good? Have you ever rapped a day in your life? I'm almost absolutely sure that I have more knowledge about rapping than you do, having raped my self and produced songs for others.

Yeah, my favorite mc is Slick Rick, but that's because the attributes that he's great in, creativity, songwritting/storytelling, originality and his easy going style, are things that I like most in a rapper. But just because those things are what I look for most in a rapper doesn't mean that those are what subjectively make a total rapper. No, if I only judged him based on what I like in a rapper, I'd come out with an impartial judgement of him like so many people do when they form these opinions on who is the best.

The whole reason that I put critical acclaim and Impact in, is so ratings on the rappers wouldn't be so much based on your own opinionated views. Their impact and the critical acclaim that they've garned also speak on how well of a performer that they are. Album sales I agree aren't that much of an important category-- that's why I gave them they lowest percentage out of everything-- yet they're a part of an entertainers ability to capture the public eye.

having raped my self
^That sounds painful.

How can you be impartial though? it's not like you deal in actual facts when you talk about flow, songwriting abilities and **** like that. It's all subjective so its not impartial at all.

I would place no emphasis at all on sales or impact on how good an MC is. That is all marketing and exposure. Because Ja Rule and Nelly sell dont mean they are any good, and the fact that 50 cent has had a large impact dont make him any good.

lol, yeah.. it hurt :rolleyes:

That's the fine line you cross, you gotta be as objective as possible that's why the multiple categories I think would help that.

Impact also, you gotta consider what kind of impact it is, and who you're impacting. If you're impacting little 13 year old girls, and are impacting the game in a negative weak way, the points wont go very well towards that category.

As far as impartial, you know what I'm saying. Often, peoples prejudices against a rapper gets in the way with how they judge them. No one is saying that it's going to be all factual, you can never have facts when you're dealing with opinions. All I'm trying to do is to have more accurate opinions.

These "who's the greatest" threads get made all the time. I just thought it would be fun to have a more accurate view by people, and an average of the sites opinion. But hey, my bad, man. I'll just post on the next thread that someone makes about who the greatest is. A thread that no one even reads the other persons opinion, or they just argue on and on with it. ;)

Yeah I dont really agree with you but you make some interesting points and it could be fun to see what people think so i apologise for jacking your thread.

...and Nas cant freestyle. I heard him admit this in an interview on Tim Westwoods radio show once...Westwood asked Nas to do a freestyle and he said he couldnt freestyle but would go away and write something for the next time he was on the show.

Hmm, that's weird. I thought that he was freestlying on "Life is like a Dice Game," and "Wake up show '94."

Apology accepted. And by the way, edit to "But just because those things are what I look for most in a rapper doesn't mean that those are what objectively make a total rapper"

I meant to say objectively, not subjectively.

Hmm, that's weird. I thought that he was freestlying on "Life is like a Dice Game," and "Wake up show '94."
Maybe they were pre-written...

HMmmmm

Tupac

Public Outlook:

Critical Acclaim- 19.5/20
Impact-16/16
Album sales- 4/4

TOTAL PUBLIC OUTLOOK, OPINION- 39.5/40

Skills:

Song Writing-10/10
Flow- 10/10 <i think that his flow was consistant>
Ability to sell points & Character, believability- 10/10
Cleverness, Creativity, Originality- 5/10
Battling-7/10
Charisma- 10/10

SKILLS- 52/60

Biggie's TOTAL SCORE------ 91.5/100